


Paranoia

by Adi_Black



Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: Angst, Drama, M/M, Poor Danny, Tragedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-02
Updated: 2012-08-07
Packaged: 2017-11-11 06:24:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 10
Words: 48,692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/475495
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Adi_Black/pseuds/Adi_Black
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Danny awakens to find himself trapped by his older evil self and certain unfortunate events happen. Even after being released Danny soon realizes it's only the beginning and he can never truly be 'free' again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Capture

**Author's Note:**

> Another transfer from ff.net. This is probably my most accomplished story I've written, definitely my longest if nothing else. 
> 
> This story is basically on huge trauma conga line for our poor protagonist hero, Danny. Very, _very_ dark themes for the majority of this story. I suppose that constitutes a trigger warning so here's a fair warning for what you'll find throughout this whole story.
> 
> Rape, dub-con, psychological torture, puking, mild drug use, underage drinking, and character death.
> 
> Anyway, now that I've given everyone fair warning for what they're getting into, buckle in and enjoy the ride!

Danny opened his eyes and groaned. He hurt all over, but his head was pounding enough to be noted as a separate entity of pain. After a second Danny closed his eyes again, waiting for the spinning to stop, and tried to think of a reason he felt so crappy.

'It must have been a fight of some sort.' Danny surmised, 'but it couldn't have been Dash, it hurts too much. I must have been fighting a ghost or something.'

His eyes still closed Danny began to go over the previous day as much as he could recall. The day had pretty much started out normal. He had thought it was a bit strange, though, when no ghosts bothered him. Danny had seen a couple on his way home, but none had stopped to harass him to his surprise. Tucker and Sam had been happy that he wasn't out getting hurt, but the silence of ghost activity was making him uneasy and he had more trouble concentrating than usual.

Danny strained his mind and started to vaguely recall the events that must have lead to his major ass-kicking.

About an hour after dinner Clockwork had appeared, as much in a panic as Danny had ever seen, and said that the thermos was missing. Danny frowned now remembering that. Why was a thermos so important? He had been terrified about it last night, but for now he couldn't see what the big deal was.

Danny finally opened his eyes again and stared at the ceiling. Or he would have if a canopy hadn't been in the way.

"What's going on here?" Danny lunged up so he was sitting and tried to get his bearings. "This is definitely not my room!"

He jumped when he heard a chuckle and someone stepped out of the shadows. Danny was sure no one had been there a second before so they must have teleported or been invisible. Danny shivered and sighed out a blue breath. He was positive now that he had been captured by a ghost, but who? The ghost was standing in an annoyingly 'strategic' position so his face and torso were still in the dark, but from what he could see he looked frighteningly familiar. Danny shivered again, but not because his ghost sense was going off. He was sure he recognized the voice, and he was terrified of it. He knew he had felt this way once before, but he wasn't sure when.

As the man walked out of the shadows Danny's heart rate accelerated, quickening to a dangerous pace as the shadows fell back to reveal the identity of his captor.

_Danger. Thermos. Phantom._ Some of Clockworks words of warning ran through Danny's head before they were stopped in fear.

"It's been awhile, Danny." Dan Phantom said, his wide grin revealing his pointed teeth.

"D-d-d-" Danny stuttered not able to say his name. His stomach churned. "Oh my god, I'm gonna hurl," Danny heaved in panic, still trying to keep his stomach contents.

"Please, not on the sheets," Dan said as Danny heaved again, and then launched himself half over the side of the bed, retching. "You see, silk is so difficult to clean." the evil man said calmly, not paying attention to the boy on the bed. "On a different note I've been thinking you should call me Dark, it's much less confusing."

Finished emptying his stomach, for now, Danny said shakily, "Dark?"

"Yes, you see Dan and Danny gets so confusing, and I think it sounds better anyway." A hand went to his flaming white hair smoothing it back before it rose again.

"What are you thinking?" Danny asked, wiping away the tears and spitting out the rest of the stringy saliva that came with puking.

Dark smiled again and Dannys' heart sank. "Wouldn't you like to know what happened to your friends?" he asked instead of answering. At Danny's wide-eyed panicked look he chuckled and said, "Absolutely nothing. Yet."

Danny narrowed his eyes, his fear lessening a little, "And me?"

Dark chuckled and looked him in the eyes, "You're going to be my toy, of course."

His eyes widening, Danny finally got some control of himself and tried to go ghost, but it didn't work.

Seeing panic return to the boys eyes Dark smiled and said, "You didn't think I would have overlooked something like that. I know what you must be thinking, after all I am you."

Danny closed his eyes and tried to breathe calmly and think. Without his ghost powers and any equipment the chance of him escaping, not even trying to defeat this monster, was less than zero.

As for what was going to happen to him, his mind shut down. He couldn't. He wouldn't. Even that insane bastard would have enough mind left to know...

Danny screamed in shock when his shirt was literally ripped off. His side burned where the fabric had torn. His hands automatically came up and he launched himself backwards, instinctively trying to get away. Danny's plan backfired though, when he banged his still sensitive head against the headboard. There was a flash of pain before he slumped down, not quite unconscious. His head spinning, now with the added pain, he tried to keep control of his body but it was useless.

"Aww, Danny, what did you do that for? We don't want you to pass out, now do we?" Dark trailed cold fingers down the side of Danny's face.

Not giving him time to get his wits about him Dark quickly rid him of his pants, leaving only the boys boxers as covering. Danny had been barefoot the whole time and hadn't even tried to wonder the location of his shoes and socks.

Getting a little control back Danny immediately went to try and keep himself covered but Dark grabbed his wrists with a soft mumur of disapproval and attached them to the headboard with a glob of ectoplasm. Danny struggled for a little bit, and then stopped, for one because one of his shoulders was already screaming in pain, and also because a small voice in his head was telling him to save his strength for whatever might happen to him later.

With a feral grin Dark ripped off Danny's boxers, leaving him completely exposed. Danny tried to curl up in a covering and protecting way, but was prevented by Dark's hands on his legs.

"W-wh-Stop!" Danny stuttered, barely able to speak.

"But we're just getting to the fun part, Daniel." Dark smiled again and Danny shuddered, seeing the remnants of Vlad in his anti.

Danny's mouth went dry when Dark slid a hand up the inside of his thigh. "Why are you doing this?" Danny managed to ask, thoughts flying through is head, "People can see loved ones die without going completely insane! It would be difficult, but people can manage!" he stopped as Dark moved his hand again.

'Why is he doing this?' Danny thought, his eyes closed, 'What happened to make me go this far?'

Dark sank down so he was practically laying on top of the boy and licked a trail down his cheek, causing Danny to flinch away. "I'm doing this because I can. I'm doing this because I want to, and nobody can stop me." Dark replied rubbing himself against the teen slighty causing his captive's eyes to widen in horor as he felt his arousal. 

"Don't." Danny whispered.

"Don't what?" Dark said, sitting on Danny's hips and trailed a cold hand down his chest.

Danny's breath sped up in fright and he couldn't speak. Dark leaned down to kiss him and he couldn't do anything to stop him, just like Dark had said. When Dark kissed him Danny felt powerless and just lay there on the bed non responsive. This made Dark a little upset. He had wanted Danny to thrash, bite, or maybe even kiss him back. The fact none of these things was occurring made Dark want to up the stakes.

He broke off the kiss and sat up again, making a duplicate that Danny eyed warily, causing Dark to smirk.

Dark made sure Danny was looking where he wanted before he had the duplicate flick on and off the lights. He then make him disappear and looked back down at Danny. When he did this he was pleased by the looks of horror, incredulity, and disgust.

"You-that's-" Danny glared at the man above him, "You're sick."

Dark only laughed, "I thought we should have a memento of our time together. I could even make copies to send to your friends and family so they can see what you've been up to. I seem to have formed a habit of this during my time in the other reality."

Danny glanced in the direction of the video camera, but couldn't see it because of the shadows. "You wouldn't send it out." Danny said attempting to sound confident while trying to regain some backbone.

"You don't believe that," Dark said. "Who knows, if I let you go I just might just send a video for kicks before I retrieve you, just to show them what will happen, what did happen."

Danny was going to respond but Dark cut the conversations short by moving his hand all the way up to grab the limp flesh between Danny's legs.

Dark grinned at the look on Danny's face. It was a perfect mask of horror and confusion. He could tell no one had ever touched him like that before. "This is really going to be fun." Dark whispered and leaned down to kiss him again and begin moving his hand.

Dark watched Danny, the boys breathing becoming short, panicked gasps of air and a blush worked it's way across his face. He grinned when he felt the flesh start to harden and Danny started to protest.

"Stop it! Stop touching me!" Danny shrieked, and unwillingly let out a low moan.

"Why? You seem to be enjoying it." Dark said with a smirk, pumping the almost fully hard member.

"I don't want it!" Danny yelled and Dark just smiled at him.

"Sure you don't, but I have a feeling you're going to want me to do this more than what I'm about to do."

Danny let out a strangled scream when Dark slicked a finger with ectoplasm and slid it inside. Danny bit his lip and attempted to thrash around, though it was impeded by the firm grip the larger man had on him. After a few moments Dark withdrew his finger and then put it back, this time with another one. Danny whimpered, his erection wilting before Dark grabbed it again with his other hand.

"We can't have this," he said, his voice deceptively disapproving, "You're supposed to be having fun."

Danny again felt tears form at the corners of his eyes. It felt odd, it hurt, the feeling of burning and stretching somewhere it wasn't supposed to be. Dark added a third finger and somehow Danny knew that after this it would all be over. He felt some of his tears slide down his cheeks, and Dark leaned down and licked them away.

Finally Dark removed his fingers from inside Danny and he also removed his hand from Danny's once again erect member. He then trailed that hand down the side of Danny's face, causing him to turn away so he wasn't looking at him.

Dark moved his hand away with a malicious chuckle and said, "This is really going to be amazing," and with two smooth motions he slicked himself up and thrust into Danny.

Danny let out a scream, broken by sobs as Dark buried himself to the hilt. Not moving yet Dark leaned down so he was again face to face with Danny, their lips almost brushing and Dark's goatee brushing against his face before he asked, "How does it feel?"

"H-hurts." Danny ground out between clenched teeth, his eyes closed tightly.

"That's good." Dark said, causing the boys eyes to open in shock, "All good things hurt at one time or another."

"Hate you," Danny glared at his older evil safe with loathing.

"I love you too, Danny boy." Dark said before he closed the minute distance and kissed him aggressively.

Danny had opened his mouth to make a sound of protest but it just ended up being another opportunity for Dark to stick his tongue down his throat. He felt this time was a million times worse though, because Dark was moving in and out of him, fucking him slowly in time with the kiss. Danny wiggled again trying to get away. At least, that's what he told himself he was doing. He knew that he would never get away unless Dark let him.

Suddenly Danny stopped and gasped, unwillingly arching into Dark. Panting he glared up at the man, thinking he must have done something, he had felt something...

Dark chuckled as Danny sharply asked, "What was that?"

"That is going to be your new best friend. Or maybe you'll call it your worst enemy." Dark replied with a slight chuckle, moving again and brushing against the something more often than not.

Danny bit his bottom lip, trying to not make any noise of any kind, but was failing for the most part. Whimpers and muffled groans began to escape him. Dark mentally chuckled watching Danny's unsuccessful attempts at muffling noises and trying to convince himself he was not enjoying it.

"You love it," he whispered in Danny's ear, causing him to shudder, not entirely in disgust.

"N-no I don't." Danny stuttered, biting back another moan. His words were completely made useless and his body betrayed what he said by arching up into a thrust. He wasn't sure if he should be grateful or not that the pain was mostly gone by now.

Dark chuckled again and said, "Refute it all you like, I know you." When he said that Danny finally gave in and much to his dismay, and Dark's pleasure, he started meeting Dark's thrusts.

Seeing his sudden change in demeanor Dark responded with a grin and went faster, harder. Danny couldn't stop the cries and moans that came from his mouth, and he also couldn't stop the heat and pressure he felt building in his lower abdomen. When Dark hit that spot a little later Danny came, arching, with a choked cry of pleasure, Dark following a moment later.

Danny felt the other man pull out and get up to probably leave the room. He most likely grabbed the video tape as well. As he slowly came down from his high he realized what he had just partially consented to do. He had just turned getting raped by his older, evil self into a pleasurable experience. He felt sick. Danny couldn't believe what had just happened but the acute pain in places that shouldn't ever hurt like that told the truth of the matter.

Danny slowly pulled his hands to his face, belatedly realizing he hadn't noticed when the ectoplasmic bonds vanished, and covered his face with them. After a moment the pain in his shoulders forced him to move, so he sat up, trying to find a position to relieve some of the pressure. Pulling a sheet over his naked lower half he pulled up his knees, wrapping his arms around them and putting his chin down on top. He tried to ignore the pain from the pressure on his back side as he just sat there staring at the wall and thinking.

How was he going to get out of here? From what he thought he had seen of the room there were no windows or doors, and with his ghost powers still shorted out he couldn't phase through the walls like what he suspected Dark had done. His heart sank as he again realized that the only way he was getting out was if Dark let him, and he couldn't see that happening.

Danny felt a slight burn in his eyes and moved a hand to wipe at them and frowned as they came away wet.

"Wet? Water? I'm crying?" Danny mumbled to himself and surprised himself at the shaking and roughness of his voice.

"Yes, you are crying." Dark said, once again causing Danny to jump and let out a startled cry.

As Danny was rendered speechless Dark continued, "I suppose this means it is time for you to go home."

Danny had only a second to comprehend what his older self said before he was hit violently across the face knocking him back, and he felt hands at his throat choking him.

Dark smiled looking down at the small, struggling figure below him. 'This is going to be perfect,' Dark thought as Danny's struggling grew weaker and his face began changing colors. The older ghost's smile turned into an evil smirk when he thought about the mini-breakdown Danny had had earlier. All his plans were falling nicely into place. Danny finally stopped struggling and fell limp, but Dark didn't let go yet, wanting to make sure he was really out.

"Oh Danny," Dark whispered, stroking the side of his face, "You're going to suffer so much. You would never tell anyone what happened, so you're going to keep it bottled up inside, and it will lead you to a pain you have never felt before." Dark chuckled, letting go fully.

He watched the slight rise and fall of the boys chest for a moment.

"Time for some fun, Danny."

xXx

End Chapter One


	2. Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Danny appears back home to a very worried and suspicious Jazz. Of course she calls his friends so they get to be worried and suspicious too, even if Tucker isn't sure if they're over-reacting or not yet.

Jazz sighed as she got ready for school. She briefly wondered where Danny was, as she hadn't seen him since before school the day previous. 

Her parents were away at some sort of conference thing and weren't expected back until the next day so it was abnormally quiet. She somehow felt that she shouldn't make any noise, so the sound when she picked up her keys was uncomfortably loud. Jazz felt like something was off, or wrong, and the feeling just grew as she neared the door. She knew Danny went out late sometimes, but he usually returned by morning. Her sense of wrongness just grew stronger as she went to the door, stopping with her hand before the doorknob.

"This is stupid, there's nothing wrong!" Jazz exclaimed to herself and pulled open the door only to jump back with a startled gasp as Danny fell through the doorway.

Jazz dropped her keys as she quickly knelt down to shake her brother. "Danny? Danny!"

Danny whimpered and slowly opened his eyes. "Jazz...?" he asked before quickly sitting up, then doubling over in pain. "W-where am I?"

"Home, Danny, you're at home." Jazz had a moment of panic, wondering if Danny had some sort of amnesia. She was about to run and call an ambulance when Danny spoke again.

"Home? But-" Danny cut off, looking around.

"You should go sit on the couch." Jazz said, helping him up and closing the door before taking him to the couch. She already knew there was no way she was going to school that day.

"Are you ok? Do you remember anything? Was it a ghost?" Danny flinched violently at her last question so she decided to gently pry further. "A ghost? Was it someone I know?"

"No, you wouldn't know him." Danny said, not meeting her eyes, which made her suspicious. "It was a new guy. He was a little harder to deal with than I thought."

Jazz could immediately tell he was lying, or at least not telling the whole truth, but she didn't want to pressure him, seeing his condition.

"How badly are you hurt?" was what she decided to ask, saving her other questions for later.

"I...um, I don't know." Danny answered honestly, trying to assess his pains. He immediately knew where the ache in his lower back and wrists were from, and he was pretty sure he had some sort of bruise around his throat, but his abdomen...

Danny almost screamed in shock, and couldn't hold back a violent flinch when Jazz touched him on the arm.

"Where are you hurt?" she asked sternly.

"Um, m-my-" Danny took a deep calming breath to stop his voice from shaking, "My ribs hurt."

"Well let's see." Jazz said, reaching for the hem of his shirt.

"No!" Danny yelled loudly, startling himself and his sister both. "Sorry," he muttered, "I think I'll just go check it myself. Take a shower and stuff, yeah?"

"All right." Jazz said uncertainly, "But tell me if you need anything." Danny nodded and slunk away up the stairs.

Sitting alone on the couch Jazz thought about Danny's behavior. She was sure she could recognize some of his symptoms of some sort of trauma from her psychology books, but it didn't all seem to fit to one specific thing. She thought she would have to look through them later.

Sighing, Jazz sat there debating whether to call some authority, as it was obvious that _something_ had happened even if she didn't know the exact details. In the end, when she heard the shower running, she decided she would just call Sam and Tucker after school to see if they knew anything.

xXx

In the shower Danny turned the water to the highest heat and stood under the steaming water, watching as his skin began to turn red. He wanted to get rid of all the traces of that maniac, but he knew he would never be able to.

Almost unconsciously he moved his hand to rest over his stomach, rubbing along raised edges of cuts in his skin. He supposed it made sense for his evil self to want to label what he thought of as his property but couldn't it have been subtler than the name Dark carved on his abdomen? Realizing where his hand was he moved it away quickly in disgust before grabbing a washcloth and soap to scrub at his skin. He scrubbed until his skin was raw, and then only stopped because the hot water was running out.

Turning off the faucets Danny grabbed a towel and put it as securely as possible around his waist before stepping out of the shower. He then stopped in front of the mirror to look at himself. His normally spiky, almost gravity-defying hair was plastered down around his face. He noticed he was shaking a little and grimaced. His light blue eyes seemed closed off, almost blank, and he could see the beginnings of dark circles under them.

Danny sighed, and a split second later he realized it had been blue. He immediately tensed and tried to go ghost, to no avail.

"Damn it what's wrong?" Danny moaned in despair.

Danny screamed when he felt a hand start to trace the backwards letters, but it was quickly cut off by an invisible hand over his mouth. He knew he should have been struggling, but was frozen as Dark slowly appeared behind him.

"Nothing's wrong." Dark purred, lazily tracing the letters, enjoying Danny's look of terror reflected in the mirror, "Your powers are still functioning, just not around me. You're home, you're safe, for now, so you should just relax," Dark finished his tracing with a small flourish. "This feeling? Get used to it," he said before bending slightly and slowly licking a trail up Danny's neck, ending with a small nip to his jaw, and phasing out of the room.

After he was gone Danny stood in shock and cursed himself. He had to grow a spine. He had to be able to function while he was around or this would go on forever, or at least until Dark got bored and killed him.

Danny shuddered, his anger dissolving, backing up to the wall before slowly sliding down it, his hands over his face.

A few moments later he was startled back to the outside world when Jazz knocked on the door and called, "Danny, are you all right? I thought I heard a scream?"

"Yeah, I'm fine." Danny called back, his voice strained, "I"ll be out in a minute."

"Whatever you say," Jazz said uncertainly and he heard her walk away.

He quickly got dressed in new clothes, vowing to get rid of the clothes he had been wearing, and went back downstairs. He hadn't eaten in awhile, and in spite of the horrible situation he was starving.

Danny grabbed a bowl of cereal and sat down to eat. A couple minutes later Jazz came in with some books and sat down as well. He looked at her questioningly but she just seemed to ignore him so he returned the favor. After slowing his pace for inhaling his food Danny found himself just sitting there playing with the remainder of his cereal. Making a face he realized he was full and hadn't even finished one small bowl.

"Are you done?" asked Jazz looking over the top of her book. Danny thought he recognized it as one of the psych books she was so in love with.

"I guess." He muttered darkly and went to throw it away.

"You should get some sleep." Jazz called as Danny started to walk through the doorway.

Danny didn't acknowledge her as he left and Jazz sighed, going back to her books. She would find out what was wrong with her little brother, even if it meant he would hate her for it.

xXx

Slowly shutting the door behind him Danny looked around his room. Everything was exactly the way he had left it before what happened.

He didn't know why, but somewhere in his mind he had expected everything to be different. Maybe because it was such a huge event to him that it seemed like everything should react to it even though there was no reason to because no one knew and if things went the way he wanted no one would ever know. Sitting in his computer chair he thought about getting online but then realized school still wouldn't be out for a couple more hours. Why bother going on the computer if there was no one to talk to?

Getting up he moved over to his bed, looking at it warily and even checking underneath it before sitting down. He made a face a second later, realizing how paranoid he was starting to get.

A thought suddenly occurring to him, Danny checked out all his ghostly powers. Dark had said they would be fine as soon as he was gone, but he wanted to make sure.

That brought up another thought. Why couldn't he transform or use any of his powers near Dark? In some ways it reminded him of some of Vlads inventions, but a little more advanced, which he supposed was natural as he was from the future. Danny thought it was probably a range thing, so if they fought he would have to try and keep it at at a distance.

Danny sighed, changing back after he discovered everything was working properly. Sitting back he began wondering what was going to happen. He knew that he would have to capture him as quickly as possible. That was obvious. He just had to figure out how to do it.

Sighing he mentally shook himself as he lay down slowly on his bed. Closing his eyes he tried not to think of what happened the last time he had been in a similar position. After a while he finally fell into a light, restless sleep.

xXx

"Danny!"

Bolting upright with a gasp Danny looked around quickly, his breath coming in short pants.

When he saw it was just Tucker and Sam he tried to calm down and started breathing more slowly.

"Are you ok, it sounded like you were having a bad dream?" Sam asked and Danny suppressed a shudder.

"Yeah, I'm fine." Danny forced a smile, glad his friends weren't very observant at times, and also glad that he was wearing jeans and had somehow ended up with his blanket covering him.

It was horrible, he thought, that after everything he went through things had to turn out like this. Subtly changing the position he was sitting in as to make it even less noticeable although it was already going away, Danny tried to assess his mental condition while trying to get ready for their line of questioning.

"Whatever you say, man." Tucker said looking at him oddly. "So what happened last night? Clockwork came and told us you needed help but didn't tell us what was up and by the time we got to where you were supposed to be there was nothing there."

Danny's stomach rolled and he tried to keep the nausea off his face. Swallowing he turned his gaze so he was looking slightly above his friends rather than at them and said, "Oh it was nothing. Everything turned out fine so there's nothing to worry about."

His friends exchanged a glance and Sam said, "Ok, we know you're not telling us the truth Danny. Jazz told us how she found you this morning. What really happened?"

"It was just a ghost, and it's not like I'm badly hurt or anything. It's not like I've never been thrown against a brick wall before. Can't we leave it alone? What, do you want me to apologize for disappearing and re-appearing seemingly uninjured without your help?" Danny exclaimed, and growled, shaking his head and running a hand through his hair. Trust his sister to blab something to his friends.

There was silence while Sam and Tucker thought about what he said. They supposed it made sense, but Danny still seemed agitated. He didn't look so good either, and it also seemed odd he had said 'seemingly' uninjured. That seemed to imply there was something wrong that they didn't know about.

Sighing, Sam said, "All right, we're just glad you're ok."

Forcing another smile and hoping it looked real Danny mentally scoffed. 'Yeah, I'm perfectly fine, I only got...'

He quickly forced his thought to derail. He didn't want to think about it while people were around. He might accidentally say something like he usually did while thinking and talking about two different things.

Danny practically jumped out of his skin, and did launch himself off of his bed when Tucker patted him on the shoulder. Landing ungracefully on the floor his friends stared at him, not sure weather or not to laugh.

Trying to calm his racing heart and also trying to keep the excess pain off his face he said, "Sorry, lot of stress lately," and gave a weak chuckle.

"You'll be at school tomorrow, yeah?" Tucker said, deciding to ignore this latest oddity in his best friend while Sam offered a hand up which was ignored and Danny got back up by himself.

Assuring them that he would be, and also that he'd call them later, Sam and Tucker reluctantly left, leaving Danny alone again.

School. He hadn't really thought of that. Dark had said that he was 'safe' in his house but hadn't said anything about other public places. He shuddered to think of what could happen. Danny would just have to be prepared. He sighed thinking of the extra weight that would have to be in his backpack to even try to help protect him if Dark made his powers short out again. That was if he was attacked while he had his bag on him.

No matter what happened the biggest thing he had to do was make sure no one knew what had happened. If someone found out he didn't know what he'd do. He was sure they'd try to 'console' him and 'make it better' but that kind of thing didn't really work, he was sure. What could they really do? It would just end up being an annoyance being treated like he was going to break down at any moment.

Danny thought he could work this out better on his own than with others. Maybe it would help to at least let them know that a ghost, a powerful ghost, was after him, but he didn't want to put them in more danger than they were in already. Maybe if Dark didn't classify them as a threat he would leave them alone.  
For now, he supposed, he would just have to focus on finding a plan and keeping secrets. Danny lay back on his bed, knowing there was no way he was going to be able to sleep, and watched the minutes slip by until he would be forced to return to school and deal with human bullies in addition to psychotic ghosts.

xXx

Watching the sun rise from the roof of his old house Dark smiled, thinking of what a good day this was going to be. Although he had only been in this world for a few days he was already appreciating the lack of good advanced ghost hunting technology. Compared to his time it was like having a modern day soldier with all his equipment go help fight in the Civil War.

He was also fairly sure they wouldn't get it any time soon since he was the main reason it had been invented and he wasn't planning to go on any rampages, at least until he had Danny.

A real smile worked it's way onto his face when he thought of how easy this all was going to be for him. Oh he knew Danny was going to fight him with everything he had, but Dark was positive that 'everything he had' wasn't going to be nearly enough.

xXx

End Chapter Two


	3. School

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Danny officially has the worst school day ever.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings: Forced blow job, puking

Danny sighed as he lay in bed. He was tired. As he had assumed he had gotten no sleep the night before, so the only sleep he had gotten, with the exception of being knocked out, was the two hour nap yesterday, which in all honesty hadn't been very restful.

He had heard Jazz leave awhile ago, probably going to one of her early classes or some committee meeting, and now he supposed he should start to get ready soon. He didn't really want to be late because it would just give him more problems than he already had. Turning toward his clock he sighed, then froze as the numbers registered.

'Oh shit, I have two minutes!' Danny thought, bolting out of bed and ignoring the mild headache he could feel starting to build. Rushing to the bathroom he tried to brush his teeth and smooth out his hair. Deciding it was as good as he was going to get it he grabbed some clothes on the floor, putting them on before sprinting back to his room, grabbing his bag. He then closed his eyes, trying to go ghost.

When he succeeded he breathed a sigh of relief, turning invisible to phase through the wall and fly to school. He got to school right as the final bell rang, and he mentally swore as he flew into the boys bathroom making sure it was empty before turning back human and running for his classroom.

Slowing to a walk right before he entered the classroom Danny sighed and put a hand through his hair to make it seem less obvious he had ran and slowly opened the door a little, slipping inside and making his way to his desk trying to be unobtrusive. Halfway to his desk he heard Mr. Lancer turn around and set down the chalk he had been using. Sliding into his seat Danny tried to just get out his materials but he knew that the teacher was going to make a big deal out of it.

"Ah, Mr. Fenton, I see that after skipping yesterday and being late today you have finally decided to grace us with your presence. Detention."

Danny wasn't sure whether to wince or sigh. Sigh because detention was just another boring thing that didn't have any effect on anything, and wince because it meant more time out of what Dark had dubbed the relative 'safety' of his house.

Shaking his head, it was better not to think about it, Danny got out his notebook and instead tried to listen to what Lancer was saying, his grades were horrible enough as it was. He dropped his pencil in disbelieving horror when Lancer started talking again.

"Today we are starting a unit on Sexual Education," there were giggles that Danny barely registered, "We will be having it mixed class because the school is too cheap to split everyone up, and we all should be _mature_ enough," he glared at the gigglers, "to be able to do this."

While the class broke out into giggles and small quiet conversations Sam leaned over to Danny and hissed, "Pick up your pencil!"

"Wha- Oh, right." Danny stammered and picked it up, setting it next to his notebook, and then stared down at it, missing the odd look Sam shot Tucker.

Honestly, was the world conspiring against him? It seemed today just wasn't his day. First he didn't get any sleep, then he was late to school and got detention,  
and now they were having a sex ed class. Could the day possibly get any worse?

Wait, no, scratch that. He didn't want to jinx himself.

He froze suddenly, going tense in a second as he sighed out a blue breath. Trembling a little he picked up his pencil, looking around. No one had noticed anything yet, not even Sam and Tucker who seemed to be involved in a conversation of some sort. Trying to calm his breathing, maybe his powers shorting out was just the result of stress, he tried to go intangible so the pencil would fall through his hand.

It didn't.

xXx

"I'm telling you something is wrong!" Sam whispered urgently to Tucker after Danny dropped his pencil after the announcement.

"I didn't say you were wrong! I'm just sure it's nothing really important or else he would have told us." Tucker said, his hands up in a defensive gesture and Sam turned for a second to tell Danny to pick up his pencil.

Turning back to him suddenly Sam said, "See, Danny's usually a scatterbrain, but this is even worse than usual!"

Tucker wondered briefly about Sam insulting Danny, but was distracted when Danny broke his pencil.

"Danny...?" Tucker asked, and most of the rooms attention focused on the teen.

Danny jumped, turning toward Tucker and the two pieces of pencil fell off the desk. "Hm? Oh, I'm fine, just a little stressed." he looked down at the remains of his writing utensil. "Don't make them like they used to huh?" he let out a chuckle that sounded slightly strained and Tucker frowned looking at him.

The other boy didn't look very good. He was kind of pale and had slight dark circles under his eyes. He also seemed nervous, as if something was going to jump out and get him at any second. Danny's hair wasn't spiked today, instead it just hung limp. At first Tucker had just attributed that to him being late, but now he had to wonder.

Tucker was about to say something else before Mr. Lancer interrupted, "Now if you are done having a conversation in my class, Mr. Foley, detention tomorrow and Fenton...yes, I think another hour today would do quite nicely."

Tucker groaned and tried to send an amused but annoyed look at Danny, but instead just exchanged a concerned look with Sam at what he saw.

If he thought Danny hadn't looked good a couple minutes ago, he looked horrible now.

xXx

Danny sat at his desk trying to control his breathing. It wouldn't do him any good to hyperventilate. Instead he tried to stay calm. He mentally giggled, noting it was a little hysterical, thinking that it was a good time to try and make himself be able to keep control of himself when Dark showed up next.

His concentration broke, along with his pencil, when he felt a hand run up his inner thigh. Danny almost choked but didn't want to draw even more attention to himself. Instead he came up with some inane excuse when Tucker asked what was wrong and didn't even sigh when Lancer gave him more detention. He had other things to worry about.

Dark was here. In his classroom. Close enough to...to...

He shuddered when he felt a cold hand run across his chest and torso and there was a disgusting wet feeling as if someone had licked the shell of his ear, then he accidentally let out a hiss of pain when his earlobe was bit.

Luckily by then everyone was too busy taking notes to notice Danny's unusually odd behavior, even Sam and Tucker had started to pay attention, not wanting to get into even more trouble. Sometimes, though, he had to wonder how oblivious everyone really was when the pieces of broken pencil floated up and dropped in his bag, and a new one sat down on his desk.

He picked it up, his hand trembling, and tried to pay attention. Lancer was saying something about labeling the reproductive organs and passing out a packet that would be due the next day. The part of Danny that was still a normal student sighed thinking about how much it sucked to have a whole packet due the next day in addition to his detention.

Suddenly the pencil was ripped out of Danny's hand, making him jump back in his chair a little and a couple people giggle. They settled back down, looking at the packet Lancer was passing out, and didn't notice the pencil start to write.

**_Hello Danny, it seems like you're enjoying yourself._ **

Danny flinched and moved to try and hide his pencil and the words, even though he knew by doing that he must be leaning _through_ his demented older self.

He thought he heard a low chuckle before more words appeared, **_Don't worry, I'm sure no one is watching. No one will be watching when you meet me behind the school during lunch either._**

Danny sucked in a breath, but the sound was half-covered by the bell for the next class. Going to his locker he dropped off his backpack and got out some papers for the next subject.

Glancing down at his watch he saw that he had done it too fast and Sam and Tucker still had a few minutes to accost him and demand explanations. He flinched when Sam came up and grabbed his wrist, and had to do his best to stay calm when Tucker flung an arm around his shoulders.

"Why were you late today?" Sam asked, not releasing the hold on his wrist.

'Is it possible to feel claustrophobic just because of people being too close?' Danny thought faintly and said, "I slept in. Jazz didn't come bug me before she left. I had to fly to school, but I was still late."

"Mmhmm." Sam said, and looked at Danny again. After a moment she let go of his wrist ('Thank god') and looked at him up and down. "Danny? Did you get new clothes?"

"What?" Danny asked, startled with the sudden change of subject and looked down at himself. Tucker had backed off a bit as well, but that was deemed completely irrelevant as he noticed his clothes. His pants were black, which surprised him that he hadn't noticed earlier, and his shirt was dark red with a lighter red and black design on the front.

The more he looked at his outfit the more he wondered how the hell he hadn't noticed what he was wearing earlier. 'I was in a hurry this morning,' he thought faintly, 'I must have grabbed what was closest when I was getting ready. These were already in the bathroom so I guess...'

"Danny?" Tucker asked and Danny snapped back to reality. "Man, you gotta pay attention, you've been out of it lately. Get more sleep, dude."

Danny chuckled weakly before turning back to same, "What, these? Nah, I've had them for awhile, just don't wear them very often." he said, lying through his teeth before forcing a smile.

Sam made a noncommittal sound before Tucker turned back to Danny, "Well, your little space-out has cost us the rest of break. Let's get back to class before we get more detention."

xXx

Danny wasn't sure if the classes before lunch were the fastest or slowest he'd ever gone to. It seemed as if they were gone in the blink of an eye, but he spent so much time thinking and freaking out about what was going to happen it could have been days.

Either way it was lunch time now and there was nothing he could do about it.

"Guys, I gotta go do something really quick." He said. It was the most generic thing that he could have said, but he hoped it worked.

"Aren't you going to eat first?" Tucker asked, his mouth full causing Sam to send him a look of disgust.

"No, I'll be back before lunch is over." Danny said, adding a silent 'hopefully' at the end even though he didn't want to think about what Dark might want to do to make him be late.

Sam and Tucker nodded and Danny went back inside the school. It was practically empty of students, and all the teachers were busy with their steak buffet lunch. Walking through the halls he made his way to the doors leading to the back of the school. Taking a breath he opened them, stepping outside.

He was sure he was cringing, but when he wasn't attacked immediately he opened one eye, then the other, looking around. He didn't see anything but Dark could be invisible or hiding somewhere. Walking farther out, by the dumpsters he was suddenly grabbed and he couldn't suppress a startled scream.

There was a low chuckle, "Why are you so surprised, you knew I would be here."

"Yeah, but I didn't think you'd be lurking around like a creep waiting to grab me." Danny shot back, surprising himself and making Dark laugh.

"So you do still have fight left in you. I'd be so disappointed if you had given up already."

"I won't give up, not until you're back in that thermos where you belong." Danny said, still feeling defiant. He wasn't sure how long it would last so he was making the most of it while he could.

Dark laughed, "Feisty, I see, but I'm never going back into that thermos. I wonder how long you can keep up this defiant act. I know you're really shaking in fear, that this is just a facade that will fade in a few moments."

"Yeah, right." Danny said, glancing to the side for a second. What Dark had said was somewhat true, but this had still helped him. It had proved he wasn't completely useless around him, at least for a short amount of time. Part of it was probably that the older man hadn't made any move to touch him, which Danny was glad for, but he was still wondering what Dark wanted with him calling him out here.

Finally Dark made his move. He had called Danny back here to do something anyway, not just talk. He wasn't exactly sure what, but he wanted Danny back to the mess he had been the first time he had seen him, a quivering mass of fear. Dark licked his lips, that had been so wonderful, part of the reason he had taken it as far as he had was to see him like that.

Beautiful people were always more gorgeous when terrified, and yes, he would admit his younger self was beautiful. Large blue eyes, soft black hair, a slight frame, those were just a few of the things that stood out.

Danny shifted under Darks gaze. He was staring at him. Why was he staring at him? It was making him even more uncomfortable than he already was, like he was being examined. When Dark suddenly stuck out a hand to run his fingers along Danny's jaw, Danny instinctively ducked, dropping down to the ground.

Realizing immediately how vulnerable he was down there he quickly straightened back up, but it was too late. Dark had decided what he wanted to do. Grabbing him by the hair, Dark twisted his hand, causing Danny to cry out in pain. Pushing down he forced Danny to his knees.

"Ow! Wha- what are you doing?" Danny asked, his voice tinged with pain. He had put his hand on Darks thighs and raised his head, trying to relieve some of the pressure.

Dark moved his other hand to undo his pants, he had changed since the last time Danny saw him, the same color scheme, but instead of a one piece suit it was jeans and a shirt. Somewhere in the back of his mind Danny wondered where he had gotten them.

All mundane thoughts such as that were completely thrown from his mind when Dark pushed down his pants a little and his erection fell out. "Get to it." he said with a smirk.

"What? I don't- no. No I won't." Danny said, trying to turn his head. He couldn't because of Darks grip on him, so instead he just closed his eyes though he knew that wasn't going to make things better.

He flinched when he felt something warm rub against his face. 'Well,' Danny thought, a little hysterically, 'I guess that answers the question if ghosts are cold everywhere.' He heard Dark sigh, then say, "Honestly Daniel. Do you want this to be worse for you?"

Danny cracked one eye open. No, he did not want something worse to happen, like Dark getting mad and taking them both to the front of the school to do god knows what to him in front of the entire student body. He glanced at Dark, yep still in the exact same terrible position as last time, and muttered, "I don't know how."

This caused Dark to laugh hysterically. He thought it was hilarious, "Of course you don't, for all Dash calling you a fag we definitely were not." Danny winced. "For now open your mouth and watch your teeth. Maybe also do something useful with your tongue. Don't worry, I'm sure you'll improve with time." he said with an evil smirk.

Tentatively Danny opened his mouth, moving forward a short distance he licked it. He shuddered a little at the taste, but the longer he took for this, the longer he was away from his ever-growing-more-suspicious friends. Steadying himself he decided to just go for it.

Trying to watch his teeth, more for his sake than Dark's, he wrapped his mouth around as much of the older ghosts cock as he could, trying not to gag, and sucked. Dark made an appreciative noise and Danny moved a little, thinking about what else to do to finish this quickly. He stroked his tongue along the bottom of Dark's member, tracing the vein while pulling back to suck at the tip.

"Well well. It seems you're a natural," Dark chuckled, "With a little more practice you'll be great at this."

'I don't _want_ to be good at this. I don't want to be good at anything remotely related to this.' Danny thought grimly, and while he was distracted in his temporary harsh musings Dark tightened his grip in his hair and thrust into his mouth.

Danny gagged when Darks cock touched the back of his throat and his automatic reflex was to swallow, which just made it worse. Dark groaned in pleasure, repeating the action. Danny pushed back on Dark's thighs, his eyes watering, and the other man drew back slowly. Danny could taste the precum from Darks erection on his tongue as it slid back coming out of his mouth with a slightly wet sound and glistening with saliva.

Glancing up Danny saw a smirk firmly planted on Darks face along with what seemed to be pleasure. He wasn't sure if it was a kind of perverse pleasure from torturing him, or just getting a...a blow job, or maybe both. Probably both. Danny winced, and Dark just smiled more, pulling Danny toward his hardness once more.

"We're not done yet." he said, "Hurry up unless you want something...unfortunate, to happen."

Danny had no desire to find out what sort of unfortunate would happen so he swallowed any pride he had left and went back to what he was doing. He licked up the side of Darks erection, then back down, taking it into his mouth and sucking. His eyes slid down to half lidded and he wasn't sure why. Maybe it was the atmosphere or just instinctual to not get anything in his eye. He suddenly blushed at that thought, then became pale.

That's right. What would happen when...It had to go somewhere.

Dark noticed that Dannys actions had gotten more subdued, as if he was thinking about something. He had been doing so well before, in fact Dark had been about to come. The fact that something seemed to have suddenly distracted his younger self from what he was doing greatly frustrated him, in more ways than one. He suddenly pulled roughly on Danny's hair, making him whimper and his teeth scrape lightly on Darks cock. Dark hissed in a breath, thrusting into his mouth again, making him gag and wince more.

Danny closed his eyes completely, and when Dark was pulling away to thrust back into his mouth he sucked him hard. He heard the other man hiss, and felt his cock twitch in his mouth, before it was filled with cum.

His first instinct was to spit it out, the taste burning in his mouth salty and hot. Before he could do it though Dark had pulled out and knelt down, holding his mouth shut with one hand while he held up a finger and waggled it at him.

"Ah-uh, you're going to swallow it. All of it. What would people say if they came back here and found a puddle of cum?" Dark scolded in an evil, teasing tone.

Danny tried to open his mouth, to spit it out and tell Dark what to go do, but only succeeded in letting a little leak out of the side of his mouth. He couldn't keep this up for very long, he had to get it _out_. With an internal moan of horror he swallowed it, then swallowed again when he choked.

"That's a good boy," Dark said as Danny coughed, all four limbs on the ground now.

Danny looked up, tears in his eyes from lack of oxygen, "Y-you," he started, then coughed again and cleared his throat. His voice was gravely and his jaw sore, probably from getting something, or somethings shoved down it, he mused. "I'm going to-"

His threat was cut off, probably in retrospect a good thing or else Dark would have probably raped him then and there, by Dark kneeling down, pushing up his chin, licking the trail of semen off his chin to his mouth, and while he was shocked, putting his tongue in his mouth. Dark devoured his mouth for a few moments before pulling back and licking his lips.

"Delicious." he said winking at him. "Don't worry, we'll do this again soon," he chuckled as he phased into the wall behind him, and Danny could only assume that he had turned invisible and flown away. Or he had just turned invisible and was stalking him again.

Sighing Danny got up with a shudder, wiping his eyes and mouth, spitting a couple times before going back inside. His stomach rolled, not pleased with him at all. It was empty besides Darks ejaculate, and there was no way that could be good for him. He swallowed around the sudden increase of saliva that happened to him before he threw up.

"I don't want to throw up. I've thrown up more the last couple days than I have all year," Danny muttered to himself, then screamed in shock and jumped about three feet in the air when an arm fell around his shoulders.

"Woah, Danny-" Tucker started but was interrupted by a hysterical Danny.

"Tucker! Oh my god, you scared the _shit_ out of me! Don't do that! _Never_ sneak up on me again!" Danny yelled, then he paused for a second and twitched, trying to calm himself. After a breath he started again, a little quieter, "What would you do if I accidentally shot you or something! I'm used to ghosts popping out of places. Humans don't need to start doing that too! _Fuck_ , you scared me."

Tucker stared at him, startled. He hadn't expected Danny to literally scream when he had surprised him, or jump into the air like a frightened rabbit, and definitely not to start screaming at him about being startled. Especially with cussing. Danny never cussed. Sam was right, something was wrong, and something was getting wronger...more wrong?, as he watched.

"Man, you all right? You don't look too good?"

Danny could feel the color draining from his face. Yelling had definitely not been the smartest thing to do. It had put more pressure on his throat and gag reflex. Also when he had been scared shitless his entire body had tensed up, and his stomach was still clenched, causing it to spasm slightly. He swallowed once, twice...

His eyes flickered to the right, calculating the distance to the trash can, and how long it would take to get the lid off. He closed his eyes, fighting another wave of nausea. He knew as soon as he moved he would gag, and then inevitably hurl. Ignoring Tuckers distressed sounds he swayed to the right, his body picking up on the movement causing him to heave.

Snapping open his eyes, Danny brought a hand to his mouth, lunging at the trash can, throwing off the lid with another heave and leaned over it, gagging. His stomach clenching again, this time with more force, it caused him to finally puke. Looking down into the trash can from where he was leaning on it, it was mostly empty, he saw the white liquidy substance at the bottom. He heaved again, the remains of semen and some bile coming up. Danny continued this until his stomach was empty and he had grown a crowd of morbidly curious people.

'Great,' he thought, spitting and shuddering at the horrid taste in his mouth, 'It's official. Worst school day ever.'

xXx

End Chapter Three


	4. With Consequence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jazz, Sam, and Tucker realize that, holy crap, something's _wrong_ with Danny.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Dream Sequence Tentacle Molestation. Just because.

After the episode in the hall Lancer had barged through the crowd demanding to know what was going on. When he found out that Danny had thrown up he sighed and put a palm to his face, ordering some poor student standing nearby to go to "Go get Miss Fenton so she can escort her brother home."

When Jazz got to the scene Danny had been forced to sit and lean on the wall by a concerned Tucker and Sam. Honestly he felt much better now that... _that_ was out of his system, but he couldn't convince anyone else that he was fine. She quickly knelt down next to him and put a hand to his forehead, which he immediately tried to brush off, but stopped protesting at the look she gave him.

Lancer and a few other teachers had tried to get the crowd to disperse, which of course they didn't and the noise had caused more kids to come see what was happening. That was how the whole school got to either see or hear about Danny being coddled by his sister after throwing up and practically being carried to her car to be taken home.

Dannys friends promised to come over once school was done, to which Danny nodded and it looked like Jazz wanted to protest but didn't actually say anything. After saying their goodbyes, and a note for Jazz if she came back so she wouldn't technically be late to her class, the Fenton kids left.

It didn't even take five minutes before the rumors began to emerge.

xXx

"I heard he has the swine flu!"

"Whatever, I bet he just ate something bad for lunch."

"No, I didn't see him at all during lunch. Someone said they saw him going to the back of the school."

"Maybe he was meeting someone."

"No, he probably just had a fight with his friends."

"That still doesn't explain why he was gone yesterday."

"Maybe he got kidnapped!"

Silence. Laughter.

"Yeah right, who would want to kidnap _him_?"

xXx

Danny sighed as he sat on his bed after brushing his teeth. He still had three hours until school got out and Sam and Tucker would come over.

He winced, wondering how that was going to work out. Sam had already been really suspicious after he had missed a day and been late, and it seemed he had convinced Tucker that something was wrong when he managed to throw up in front of him for seemingly no reason. Danny kicked off his shoes and lay back on his bed. Since when did someone need an excuse other than 'I didn't feel good' to be sick anyway?

Closing his eyes he tried to relax, hoping that since he had already harassed him once today Dark would leave him alone. After all, he wouldn't want Danny to be so tired he would fall asleep in the middle of sex.

"Wait, what?" Danny asked out loud, bolting up and made a noise that sounded like 'argh!' before putting his face in his hands and shaking his head.

He did not want to be thinking about that. Taking his hands off his face he looked down into his lap and made a face as he realized he was still wearing the clothes Dark had put him in. Swearing to get rid of them once and for all when he woke up he quickly slipped them off and threw them in a corner, grabbing some of his own clothes to put on instead.

As he pulled on his jeans he paused, thinking. He hadn't changed into pajamas for three days. Maybe that was why he wasn't getting enough sleep. Looking around his room he saw a pair of flannel plaid pants. Grabbing them he put them on, along with a plain white t-shirt. Laying back on his bed he noticed that he was slightly more comfortable.

'Now if only I didn't have to worry about a maniac jumping out of nowhere and molesting me.' he thought cheerlessly.

Danny sighed and looked at his clock. Still two hours before Sam and Tucker would probably be there. Closing his eyes he decided to try and get some sleep. Even if he didn't end up sleeping it meant that he could at least try to relax for awhile.

He knew that he really should be trying to figure out a way to capture Dark, but he was just so tired...

xXx

Danny knew he was dreaming. There was no way he could _not_ be dreaming. For starters did a field like this really exist? Large and green, in the middle of a copse of trees. Flowers sprinkled throughout it and the sense that a deer or a fox with her kits would walk across it at any second.

Then of course, if a field like that did exist Danny certainly didn't know where it was so someone would have had to have driven him there, and he could honestly say he couldn't remember getting in a car for the last week other than Jazz driving him home from school today.

Looking up he noticed it was a clear blue sky with a couple little white clouds puttering around.

"You have got to be kidding me. It's like Nocturne all over again." Danny said, shaking his head, "No one has dreams like this. This only happens in really clichéd horror movies before the monster jumps out of nowhere to rip someone's head off."

As if him speaking had triggered something things began to change into the evil cliché of things and Danny found himself wishing it had stayed the other way.

"Wonderful, a nightmare." Danny muttered, wishing he would wake up. Usually when he was conscious of his dreams he woke up soon after but unfortunately it seemed like it wasn't going to be like that this time.

The ground suddenly changed, turning into more of a swamp or bog than solid ground and Danny staggered as he sunk a little bit. Looking around he tried to tell himself, remind himself, that it was a dream. Nothing like this was happening in real life. That still couldn't stop his fear though.

Danny slowly started walking toward the edge of the clearing, hoping that that was the edge of the dream and when he got there he would wake up, but he was suddenly and horrifically impeded by vines squelching their way out of the ground. He quickly turned to go the other way, but stopped dead at what he saw. 

There were vines behind him too, but they were holding something. The vines were dangling bodies, or in some cases pieces of bodies and Danny put a hand up over his mouth and backed up a step when he began to recognize some of them, and they were all calling out to him, asking why he hadn't been there in time, why he was with _him_.

He was too busy staring in front of him to realize what was going on behind him until it was too late. The vines had worked their way forward and wrapped themselves around his arms and legs, lifting him into the air despite his struggles to get free. For a minute he thought they were going to tear him apart like it was doing to everyone else, but then something else began to happen.

Danny shuddered as a vine, slick with some sort of secretion, slid up his arm while still holding him in place and went into his shirt. He twitched and struggled again as he felt it slide along his stomach, moving up to take his shirt along with it as it rubbed along his neck and on his face.

"This is so sick, so sick and _wrong_ and I need to _wake the fuck up right now_!" Danny screamed before the tip of a vine was shoved in his mouth, giving him a flashback about what had happened earlier, and another one went down his pants.

Danny twisted and turned but only ended up making the vines agitated so they wrapped around him tighter. The vine in his pants wrapped itself around his limp penis and seemed to start stroking him and he could feel another one making its way down his back.

'Wonderful, first I get raped by myself, now I get raped by a plant. What next?' Danny thought pseudo-calmly while actually mentally screaming.

Danny thought he was done for when he felt the vine stroke along his ass, but suddenly the still muttering voices of his comrades reached a crescendo and screamed, " _Him, it's him!_ '

Opening his eyes, he hadn't even realized he had shut them, Danny managed to look down and saw Dark standing there. If he had been able to say anything he would have asked him what he was doing there, but as he couldn't he just stared instead.

His older self seemed slightly angry, which Danny thought was odd. Why would he be upset, it seemed like even in his mind Danny was torturing himself, so it was saving him some trouble.

"Mine." Danny thought he heard him say to the vine and raised a hand. "You have no place in this mind."

'That's right, it's my mind! This is still a dream!' Danny thought frantically when the vine got closer and closer to it's goal. 'I need to wake up. I _need_ to wake up!'

Suddenly it seemed as if something cracked and he fell into the muck, the vines disappearing. As he began to sink he thought he heard Dark say something.

xXx

"Danny, your friends are here!" Jazz called up the stairs and thought she heard a muffled thump as if he had fallen out of bed.

'Well at least he was sleeping.' she thought and then frowned when he yelled back that he would be right there and heard the shower running.

Jazz sighed and turned back to Dannys friends who were sitting on the couch. Sam had her arms crossed and looked determined about something, and Tucker seemed slightly hesitant but determined as well.

"We want to know what's going on with Danny." Sam said, getting straight to the point.

"I'm not sure." Jazz said, sitting down as well and tapping the arm of the couch in thought, "Something must have happened, but I can't figure out what! It's not like he's physically hurt so much as...paranoid."

Sam and Tucker nodded in agreement with Jazz's assessment.

"Yeah, when I saw him right before he got sick and put my arm on his shoulders he practically jumped through the ceiling. It was like he had been expecting someone else, someone he didn't want to see." Tucker said frowning.

Sam and Jazz thought through the last couple days after Danny had come back from whatever had happened and their frowns deepened. Was Danny avoiding physical contact? It certainly seemed so, but for something to effect him that way it must have been...

"Sorry guys, I had to go take a shower, feeling kind of gross yeah?" Danny said with a half grin. His hair was still damp and everyone stared at him as he sat on the couch.

There was slightly awkward silence for a few moments before Jazz said, "Danny, what happened to you?"

xXx

'Wonderful, they've been thinking,' Danny mentally growled, trying not to show it on his features or run his hand through his hair. 'Can't they just leave me alone. I shouldn't have given them any time, I should have come straight down here, but that would have been bad.'

When Danny had woken up he was drenched in sweat, his breath coming in short pants and he had been trembling. He knew he needed some time if he was going to pull himself together, and a shower was the fastest way he knew to do it. The cold water had helped shock him back to the semi-normalness he had been the last few days. He had quickly scrubbed himself and washed his hair before hopping out of the shower to dry off. It hadn't really seemed to take all that long to get dressed and come down here, but apparently it had been long enough for them to start having ideas.

Danny sighed, deciding to tell the truth. Or at least a very censored version of the truth. "I heard about a ghost attack, I went to check it out, I got my butt kicked and passed out, woke up in a room, passed out again and woke up here."

"Wait, you don't mean...you got kidnapped?" Jazz exclaimed and Sam and Tucker looked shocked as well.

"Uh, yeah if you want to get technical," Danny said looking at them oddly, "You mean you _didn't_ suspect that?" When Jazz looked down Danny's eyes narrowed.

'How oblivious are they? Or how...how can they suspect something happened to me and then _not_ think that I got kidnapped when I didn't come home? What else did they think happened? I stayed over at somebody's house? Slept on the street? God, I only wish that was what had happened.' Danny thought.

There was silence for a few moments before Sam asked, "So is that why you've been so weird the last couple days?"

"I guess." Danny muttered darkly, his mind having wandered over to more dangerous territory after they had talked about kidnapping.

"Well it's perfectly normal," Jazz started, her psychologist/therapist persona firmly in place, "Kidnapping is a terrifying experience and it can have dramatic effects on the people involved. If you need anything don't hesitate to come to any of us. I mean-"

"I don't need your help," Danny said sharply, cutting her off. "I'm fine, it was the past and I'm fine."

He stood up to start walking out of the room and Jazz and Sam stood up too, leaving Tucker to sit awkwardly on the couch.

"Danny!" the girls called at the same time, then glanced at each other before Sam continued on her own, "You're _not_ fine. Are you sure that what you told us is all that happened? I mean, you didn't even say that you saw the ghost who did it. Besides, why would someone do that in the first place if they don't even try to get a ransom or since I guess it was a ghost, revenge or something?"

By the time Sam had finished talking Danny had stopped in the doorway. Slowly he turned around and glared at them. The three were silent while Danny stood there for a second and took a breath.

"Why does it seem like you want me to be hurt? You want me to be mentally scarred? If something did happen are you sure you would want me to tell you?" Danny's voice had started out softly, but it was slowly raising in volume. "You would want me to tell you what happened when I was kidnapped, every sick detail of what had happened? If I was...If they had...if... _there is nothing you can do about it_!" Danny screamed and stormed out of the room. They could hear Danny stomping up the stairs and there was the sound of a slamming door and then silence.

The people in the living room were left stunned until Tucker broke the silence.

"Guys, honestly I thought you were being a little over-dramatic with the 'something's wrong with Danny' thing, but you're right. Something is up, something bad happened to him and we _need_ to find out what it was."

Jazz and Sam nodded and the three teens started to try to piece together what Danny wasn't telling them.

xXx

"We should have a party." Dash said, leaning back on a bench he had kicked some kids off of at the park.

"Why?" Kwan asked and Dash rolled his eyes.

"Who needs a reason, but if we did it would be because we haven't had one in awhile."

"Who's house would it be at?" Paulina asked and everyone shrugged.

"Mine, since I brought it up," Dash said, "My parents are going to be gone for a couple days soon anyway. I'll find out when and then we can start sending out the word."

Everyone nodded and then started talking about random things. Suddenly a shadow came over them and the group of teenagers looked up to see a young man standing in front of them. He was tall and had short, kind of spiky black hair and a goatee. You couldn't see his eyes because he was wearing sunglasses, but he had on a pair of navy blue jeans with a white shirt and black sweatshirt.

"I couldn't help but notice that you were talking about a party," he said with a slight smile. His voice was deep, but still almost silky.

The teens exchanged glances before Dash said, "Yeah, so?"

"This may be a little forward of me, but I was wondering if I could be invited as well. It's not like you won't be getting anything out of it," he added at the dubious looks he got, "I'm betting your party would like a little entertainment that you're too young to buy right now."

Dash raised an eyebrow. Was this guy seriously offering to buy them booze if they let him come to the party? Dash's parents had a stash, of course, but that wasn't nearly enough for everyone who he was thinking of inviting. He still thought it was kind of odd that someone was offering to do this for them when he didn't even know who they were.

"You're trying to buy your way in?" Dash finally asked and raised an eyebrow making the man kind of chuckle a bit.

"I promise not to touch any of you if that's what you're worrying about," he said and some of the teens chuckled nervously, "It's just that I haven't been to a party in so long and it would be kind of nice to have a bit of excitement."

There was more silence before Dash told the man to wait a minute and the teens huddled up to talk about it. After a couple minutes they broke up and Dash said, "All right, we decided you can go."

"Excellent," the man smiled, "I heard that you don't know when it's going to be exactly. If you can find out tonight I'll be here at the same time tomorrow."

Dash and a couple others nodded and the man started to walk away before Paulina suddenly called, "Wait, we don't even know your name!" causing the man to stop and turn back around.

"My friends call me 'Dark.'"

xXx

End Chapter Four


	5. Realizations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jazz, Sam, and Tucker come to the unsettling conclusion that Danny might have been raped, though they have no clue who might have done it, while Valerie gets confessed to first hand. Val decides that getting herself and Danny invited to the party may be a good idea to relax, and Vlad shows up for extra complication points.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Hand job and the usual mental trauma.

After Danny slammed the door to his room he slid down behind it, leaning back on the wood. He tried to ignore the slight burning sensation in his eyes telling him he was about to start crying and shook his head angrily.

"Why are they so persistent? Why can't they just leave me alone!" Danny murmured to himself, feeling hot tears run down his cheeks. He asked the question and he already knew the answer before a soft voice in his head answered for him.

'They're your friends. They want to help you.'

"It's not like they _can_ help me. Nobody can help me. Why did this all have to happen to me?" Danny replied to himself, sniffling a bit as he wiped his cheek on one sleeve.

'You need to tell someone.' his conscience, or at least that's who he thought it was, replied, 'This is killing you. Even if it's just to let it out you need to say it.'

Danny was silent, thinking about that for a few moments, his tears drying up a bit. "Yeah, but who?" he finally whispered.

His close friends and sister were immediately thrown out of the options. He had enough to deal with in his 'personal life' as it was. His parents were shot down too. They would be home that night and he could only cringe to imagine what their reaction would be to find out what happened to him. He contemplated the idea of telling Vlad for awhile. Even though he was his 'arch enemy' he had a feeling the older man would listen to him. Also he had a better chance of defending himself than regular mortals, being a Halfa as well. He finally threw that idea out the window as well with another random excuse.

Danny went through this process of elimination for a few more people before he finally thought of Valerie. He tilted his head to the side, contemplating what might happen if he told her. She seemed like a capable person, and in the future she had looked like she could handle pretty much anything. Finally making up his mind Danny stood up and walked to his phone, picking it up with a trembling hand before dialing the numbers.

After a couple rings the phone was picked up, "Hello?"

Danny was silent for a second, almost wishing her father had picked up so he could chicken out of it, "Uh, hi, Valerie?"

"Yes?" her voice sounded confused and Danny thought she probably didn't recognize his voice.

"Hi, it's Danny." he was silent through her speech of 'oh Danny, what's up?' and when she was done he took a deep breath and steadying himself said, "Uh, I'm ok, could be better. Listen, do you think you could meet me somewhere, maybe outside the Nasty Burger in like ten minutes?"

There was silence on her end for a second, "Yeah, sure that's fine." a pause, "Danny, is something wrong?"

Danny could practically hear her frown and decided to be semi-honest. "Uh, kinda. I'll tell you more about it later."

"Ok..." her voice sounded a bit confused now as she trailed off. "Ok. I'll see you in ten then?" she asked, sounding a bit more firm.

"Yeah, see you." Danny said and they both hung up.

Danny swallowed thickly, thinking about what he had just set himself up for.

'I really hope I just made the right decision.'

xXx

Sam Tucker and Jazz had moved their little party into the kitchen and were sitting around the table with pieces of paper. Tucker had insisted that they didn't need it, but Jazz had overruled him, saying that it seemed more official. It seemed kind of odd to him that it seemed as if this was being treated like a game instead of seriously trying to figure out what was wrong with his friend.

He had finally thought of a use for the paper and started listing off all the things he knew about what happened or what seemed different about Danny since he had been kidnapped. So far he had that he avoided physical contact like the plague and he seemed to be acting like someone was after him. He seemed kind of distrusting of his friends and was shutting himself off.

Thinking what Danny had said before he stormed off he frowned. At first it sounded like he was being hypothetical but the last thing he had said, ' _There is nothing you can do about it_!' definitely came off as ringing an alarm. He had said 'can' instead of 'could' or just saying something like 'nothing happened'. 

Even though that denial would have been seen through it would have been less descriptive of what he had said, considering also that everything before that had been purely hypothetical.

Tapping his pencil Tucker looked at his list again, shrugging, before adding 'freaked out at sex-ed announcement' to the list before he stopped. His eyes widened and he looked down his list again, mentally adding Dannys little outburst and disappearance at lunch.

"Tucker, are you ok?" Sam asked, noting his unusual silence and absence of fidgeting.

"No, I'm not ok," Tucker replied, his voice faint and Jazz and Tucker leaned forward to hear him, "I think, and I really, _really_ hope I'm wrong about this, but I think," he lowered his voice to a whisper as if he was afraid of someone overhearing, "I think Danny was raped."

There was a long heavy silence while everyone thought about the implications.

Jazz's first instinct was to deny it, after all who wanted to be told that their sibling had been raped? Unfortunately the more she looked at how he had been acting the more it seemed it was the truth. Sam was having the same trouble to a certain extent. She had wanted to know what was wrong with her best friend, and now that she thought she knew she wished she didn't.

"Now I understand what Danny meant by that last outburst," Sam finally murmured and the others nodded. "It seems like though...what if the person is still after him? Tucker said that Danny seemed to be expecting someone, and what happened when he vanished at lunch today?"

"We have to save him," Jazz said and Tucker threw her a look.

"Save him how? From what? From who? And again, _how_?"

After a short pause Sam said, "Well, it sounds like it's from a ghost for the what part, as for who...I'm not sure. Doing that to a person doesn't really seem like anything most of the ghosts we know would do. They have more of an 'I'll blast you through a brick wall' type of mentality."

"Yeah," Jazz said frowning, and her voice sounded sort of detached as she spoke again "Doing something that intimate seems more like something a human would do."

"Or a half-human." Tucker said causing them both to look at him, "What if it was Vlad? He's the only other Halfa there is, and he _is_ after your mom. Maybe he finally gave up and decided to go after Danny instead?"

The three teenagers sat, frowning. It seemed like a good theory but at the same time it seemed like something was wrong with it. Danny seemed way too high-strung for it to be Vlad harassing him.

"I think," Sam said finally, "The only way we're going to find out who did it for sure, or if it really happened, is if Danny told us, but I can't really see him doing that any time soon."

"So we just have to wait and watch him?" Tucker said helplessly and everyone sighed.

"That's what it looks like," Jazz said, and looked up in the direction of Danny's room. "I just hope he doesn't break down before we can do something."

xXx

Valerie had already known something was wrong when she talked to him on the phone, but seeing Danny standing alone in front of the Nasty Burger solidified the weird feeling she had been having since she had seen him briefly at school.

As she got closer she started to be able to see more details. He must have taken a shower recently because his hair still seemed damp and it was falling down flat on his head instead of spiked out. Dannys skin seemed kind of pale, and even though his posture was usually slouched it seemed like he was just barely succeeding in keeping himself standing.

Finally she stopped, standing next to him, and had to suppress a gasp when he looked up to meet her gaze. His eyes, normally so clear and _blue_ were dull and blank. Danny's eyes had a slight redness as if he had been crying as well as more than a hint of shadows telling the tale of him not sleeping.

"Oh, hey Valerie, you're early." Danny said and Valerie frowned at his tone. It sounded like he wasn't happy to see her, just kind of resigned.

"You're earlier." she said, instead of commenting on it for now.

His mouth turned up into a sort of half-smile. "Yeah, I guess I am. Uh, do you want to walk somewhere?"

Valerie nodded and they started walking next to each other. "So you wanted to talk to me about something?" Valerie asked after a few minutes of silence and aimless wandering.

"Yeah..." Danny said, and shook his head. "Sorry, it's just kind of...hard for me to talk about."

"Should we sit down?" Valerie asked, gesturing towards a bench they were approaching. They were near the park, but not where very many people went. Danny just shrugged so she steered them over and they sat down.

Danny sighed, his eyes flickering over to one side as if he was looking for someone before he focused back on her. "Sorry, it's just, I'm not sure if I should ease into it or just say it before I loose my nerve."

"Whichever you choose is fine." Valerie said, even though she was getting kind of annoyed with his evasiveness. She knew it had to be something big though, she had never seen Danny act this way before and it made her uncomfortable and nervous for some reason.

He seemed to think it over for a bit before he said, "What's the worst thing that's ever happened to you?"

Valerie was a bit taken aback by that question and said, "Um, ok. I'll tell you if you promise to tell me too." after his hesitant nod she continued, "I would say that it was when my dad lost his job. I went from popular, rich, and with a ton of friends to the opposite of all that overnight. It did get a little better, but the moment I found out what had happened it felt like the world was going to end."

Danny nodded, and Valerie waited for him to give her his end of the deal.

'I can't do this!' Danny's panicked thoughts yelled, 'I should have never come out here, why did I have to do this?'

'I need to keep my promise though.' Danny thought quickly and winced before opening his mouth, closing it and taking a deep breath through his nose and sighing it out through his mouth. He could see Valerie watching him with mostly hidden impatience and he couldn't help but stall a little longer.

"I'm sorry, I know that must have been pretty bad. I've had some pretty bad days too, but one recent one is close to the worst thing I can imagine. Before it I couldn't even imagine it happening to anyone else, let alone me." Danny could feel her curiosity and interest increase and he had to just say one more thing before he let it out. "Just...can you please promise me that you won't tell anyone? Not your dad, Sam, Tucker, anyone?"

"I guess so." Valerie said, willing him to continue, but he just gave her a stern look and she sighed softly before saying, "Yes, I promise not to tell a single soul."

Danny winced at her phrasing and licked his dry lips. He just had to say it, three simple words and supposedly a huge weight would be lifted off his chest. In the back of his mind he realized that after he said it there would be lots more explaining she would want done, but for now he just had to focus on actually saying it.

' _Say it_.'

"I was raped," Danny whispered, his voice barely audible and if Valerie hadn't been leaning forward in anticipation she probably wouldn't have heard.

Reeling back in shock Valerie put her hand over her mouth. It would have been an almost comical reaction if not for the seriousness of the confession.

"Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry! Are you ok-no, you can't be ok! When was it? Who was it? Wait, if you don't want to talk about it I'm sorry. Oh Danny-!" Valerie stopped herself from saying any more and looked over at Danny.

Danny wasn't sure what he was feeling. First he was shocked that he had managed to say it, then surprised at Valeries outburst, scared about what might happen if someone found out, slightly relieved that she had taken it 'well', and now he was almost regretting it because he supposed he wasn't going to be able to go without answering at least a couple more questions.

"It was...two days ago." Danny paused with a small frown, his voice still soft. "It seems like so much longer than that though. I-I don't feel like talking about who it was, but..." he trailed off.

"But what?" Valerie asked softly.

"I don't want to get you in trouble. You should just be careful." Danny said, his eyes averted.

By him saying that it just gave Valerie more questions, but she decided to not ask them for now. Maybe some other time when it didn't look like Danny was about to either cry or bolt.

"So, um, I take it I'm the only one you've told?" Valerie asked and Danny nodded. "Oh. Well, it's good to get things off your chest. It's also good to relax and have fun so..."

"What is it, Valerie?" Danny asked and it sounded as if he was getting annoyed.

"There's been this rumor that Dash was going to have a party soon and I was thinking maybe we could go. I'm still friends with Star, so she might be a good enough connection to get in." At Dannys dubious look she said, "Don't worry, it'll just be a good time. I'm sure that you can't get over something like what happened to you that easily, but you can't sit around stewing it over forever."

"I suppose..." Danny said and sighed, "Yeah, all right. I guess I'll go for a bit, if I do end up being able to." he said and Valerie smiled at him.

"Cool, well, if there's anything else you want to tell me about, just do it. Don't just keep it to yourself, ok?" Valerie wasn't very pleased by sound Danny made, almost as if he was brushing her off, "Well, I have to go. Homework and stuff." she said, stretching as she stood up.

"See you at school." Danny said and waved to Valerie as she walked off.

'I guess that wasn't so bad,' Danny thought, 'I still don't know why I agreed to the stupid party, but maybe I'll be lucky and they won't let me come. Either way I should probably get home soon.'

Danny got home and immediately went to his room. Sam and Tucker had already left a little while ago. He felt like some peace and quiet before his mom and dad got home.

Getting on his computer he tried to play his game, but he kept thinking of things and it would distract him. Looking at the clock he sighed, thinking his parents would probably be home soon. He didn't really mind that much, even though he lived in the same house it didn't seem like he saw them that much anyway, but at the same time he almost hoped they wouldn't be back for a few more days.

Sitting on his bed and leaning against his headboard Danny started to zone out. His sleep lately had been anything but restful, and now he was almost scared to fall asleep. He hoped he would get over that soon. Dannys eyes drifted shut for a few moments before snapping open as he felt a dip in the side of his bed.

When he saw Dark sitting there he unconsciously scooted backward, trying not to remember what happened last time Dark had him cornered on a bed.

Dark chuckled as Danny looked at him warily. He knew he had surprised the boy, that he had tried to make up 'rules' for his little game. Dark supposed there were a few rules, but they were never constant, changing depending upon the situation of the encounter.

When he didn't move toward Danny to restrain him immediately the boy looked slightly confused and Dark smiled about what a good job he was doing. Finally Danny opened his mouth to speak.

"What are you doing here?"

"Why should I not be here? It is my room after all." Dark said, shrugging. Honestly he didn't think of this place as his 'home' any more, but it was fun to torment Danny even more with the reminders that he was what he would have become if not for Clockworks interference.

Danny paled a bit, and scooted back, now practically flat against the head of his bed. "But you already saw me once today, and it's not your room any more. Not your _world_. You said you wouldn't..."

Danny trailed off as Dark began to laugh. He was right, Danny was making up his own rules. Some of which seemed to be 'only once a day' and 'not in my house.'

"Danny, Danny, Danny, you know how much trouble you get in when you presume things," Dark smirked, moving forward to stroke a hand down the side of the younger males face, "I never said I would only see you once a day. I also never said that you were safe in your house. What I said was 'you're safe for now', meaning it could change at a moments notice, or without any at all."

Flinching at the touch Danny looked away though he knew Dark didn't like it. He couldn't help himself, he didn't want to look at him even though that impulse seemed to make things worse for him.

His mind was racing, his thoughts going faster than normal while he tried to think of something to do. Jazz was still home, he knew. Maybe he could call for her, but no, that would mean putting her in danger. Last time Dark had only knocked her out but that was before all this happened. He didn't need her alive any longer. Dannys parents were also supposed to be home soon and they had a habit of barging into his room, and they might actually have some ghost-hunting equipment. He wasn't sure if it would do much good though.

"What are you thinking?" Dark asked, grabbing him by the chin and forcing him to look back at him.

"Nothing," Danny said, brushing aside the absurd thoughts, "What are you going to do with me? I'm sure you didn't just appear to have a conversation about despair." he finished, his voice dripping sarcasm.

"You're right, I didn't." Dark said, moving closer so their faces were just inches apart. "I was thinking that maybe you could have a few lessons. You are quite good for a beginner but I'm sure you could be better. Also," Dark moved his hand down to Dannys crotch, making him flinch away and whimper, "it seems I've been a bit lacking in giving you something back."

"I don't want anything back," Danny said quickly, "I mean, I don't want you here in the first place. I don't 'give' you things, you take them and like this you wouldn't be giving it to me you'd be _forcing-_ "

Danny's panicked ramble was cut off as Dark pressed his lips to his roughly, forcing his mouth open to admit his tongue. Danny whimpered and tried to move his head away but Dark was still restraining him. When Dark finally drew back Danny was flushed and panting, and when Dark released his chin he looked down and to the side, not wanting to see the other mans face.

"You say you don't like it but your _body_ ," Dark squeezed Danny's crotch again, "tells me otherwise."

"Just because my body seems to like it doesn't mean I like it." Danny muttered, "I never consented to anything and just because my body reacts in some stupid way doesn't mean _I_ do."

Dark just laughed, brushing off his comment as he did with everything else, "Of course you think like that, but one day I know you'll be _begging_ me to fuck you."

Danny was about to protest loudly on that point but when he opened his mouth what came out instead of a stream of profanities was a moan as Dark reached into his pants and grabbed his half-hard member. He immediately blushed at the condescending smirk Dark gave him, closing his mouth, and tried to distract himself from what was happening.

He knew it wouldn't work very well when Dark began to slowly stroke him sending small waves of pleasure through his body. Danny bit his lip, not wanting his betraying body to have it's way completely.

Dark moved Danny down the bed a bit so the boy was lying flat. He unzipped Dannys pants the rest of the way and pulled them and his boxers down past his hips to the top of his thighs, exposing him. He smirked at Danny's protest, cutting it off with another rough kiss while still stroking him maddeningly slow. The teen was fully hard now and Dark moved a hand up his shirt, pushing it up to expose his stomach. The scratches were almost gone due to Danny's advanced healing ability and Dark mentally sighed. A pity. Oh well, he supposed he would just have to give him another mark.

Moving down he began to lick and suck at the exposed flesh before nipping him causing Danny to flinch and cry out before he could stop himself. Dark smiled at bit him again, this time an actual _bite_ to which Danny whimpered loudly, arching slightly, and without thinking moved a hand down to try and push him away.

Dark shook his head, releasing the flesh from his teeth leaving a nice bloody oval mark, and grabbed the hand, moving his body back up so his face was at a level with Danny's. "You know that wasn't a very good idea," he murmured against the shaking boys lips, "I'm tempted now to take you right here, regardless of if dear Mother and Father return home," Danny's eyes widened in horror at the prospect, "It's quite unfortunate that I have things to do."

Danny's eyes widened more, almost impossibly wide, as he thought about what kind of 'things' an evil, mad, ghost from the future would have to do. He missed the last thing Dark said, muttered really, and then would have missed everything after that in any case as the ghost picked up the pace.

Dark looked down at Danny, the boy was panting and flushed, obviously trying and failing to control his 'rebellious' body. Dark liked that fine. Stroking Danny firmly and roughly he finally heard the sounds he wanted to emerge from the teen. Moans and whimpers of _pleasure_ had Dark grinning like the madman he was. For a second he contemplated actually stopping to see if Danny really would beg for it now, but then he remembered what he had to do and with a mental scowl continued his chosen course of action.

'Shit, this bastard is going to make me come,' Danny thought, disgusted with himself and the whole situation.

After a few more moments Danny finally arched with a cry and came over Darks hand. He came down panting and shaking, trying to get over the side effects of orgasm before Dark could do anything else to him in his semi-helpless state.

"Very good," Dark murmured against Danny's lips, kissing him again and taking advantage of Danny's already open mouth by putting his tongue down his throat while ravaging his mouth.

Finally getting his strength mostly back Danny shoved at Dark, who laughed at him but got up anyway. Danny remembered that he said he supposedly had things to do (besides him, Danny thought with a shudder), and wouldn't take time for a punishment.

"Leave me alone," Danny spat, trying to fix his clothes and already thinking about taking another shower. He was taking a lot more than he used to, he realized with another scowl.

"As you wish, but you know I'll be back," Dark smirked and with a condescending bow walked through his wall to the outside and vanished.

Danny was forced to contain a scream of frustration and helplessness as he gathered things to go take a shower. He didn't want to greet his parents when they got home looking like that.

xXx

Jazz heard the shower running and sighed. She thought she knew what had happened to Danny and it was horrifying. She didn't want to think about it though she knew she should be trying to find a way to help him, but like Tucker had said they had no clue about _anything_.

With a groan Jazz started to lean down on the table but was startled upright as the door slammed open.

"Jazz, my sweet daughter! Come see Dad, he missed you!" her fathers booming voice echoed through the small entry hall.

With another sigh, this one slightly indulgent, and a smile, she went to go see her parents. She froze for a second when she saw Vlad walk in with them but recovered quickly. She didn't want them to think anything was wrong.

"Hi Mom, Dad...Vlad." She said, and let curiosity leak into her voice at the last name and her mom picked up on it.

"Jazz honey, how are you?" She gushed and in the brief silence before she was going to explain Jazz heard the shower shut off and knew Danny would be down soon. "Vlad is here for a visit. He came to the convention too and your father just couldn't resist the chance to hang out with his old college buddy." Maddie shook her head with a chuckle.

"I hope I'm not intruding," Vlad said with a smile and Jazz forced herself not to frown at him.

"Maybe you should ask Danny," Jazz muttered but nobody heard.

Jack suddenly looked around, as if realizing someone was missing, "Jazz, where is your brother? I had thought that he would have come down to see me as soon as we got here."

"I'm here, I was just in the shower."

Everyone turned to look at him and Maddie and Jack both broke out into smiles, and after a minute Vlad did too though it was a bit less enthusiastic as if he had noticed something was off with the boy. Jazz noticed that his hair was spiked like it usually was and he must have taken a few extra moments to put it that way. She was sure he only did it because he didn't want their parents to worry or get suspicious.

"Danny, my baby! How were you while we were away?" gushed Maddie, squeezing her son into a hug that Danny flinched minutely to and forced himself to return.

"I was fine, mom, I'm not a kid any more." he grumbled, pushing away in what seemed like an average 'this is not a manly thing to do' teenage moment. Maddie chuckled softly, conceding the point. "Yes, well we were just explaining to Jazz that Vlad was going to be staying with us for a few days."

"Where is he staying?" Danny asked, raising an eyebrow. He figured the options were the RV, the lab, or the living room. He hoped those were the only options he really didn't need another crazy ghost (even if Vlad was only half) staying with him.

"I was thinking maybe we could pull out another mattress and he could stay in your room," Maddie said and Danny mentally winced, wondering if he could refuse. Still trying to think of something Danny tried to stall, or give someone, namely Jazz, a chance to say something. "Oh."

True to form Jazz started to protest on Dannys behalf. "But mom, Danny is a teenager! He needs his own room, it's part of their development!"

"It will only be for a few days," Maddie said firmly and Jack just looked back and forth and nodded gamely.

"Whatever," Danny sighed and walked out, into the kitchen. He didn't think he would be getting very much privacy for awhile.

xXx

_"Sorry if I'm intruding, I tried to convince Maddie I was fine with a hotel but Jack insisted I stay here as his guest."_

_"It's fine," Danny said, though a tinge of annoyance made its way into his voice, "It's not like you'll be in here other than sleeping, right?" he asked and Vlad nodded._

_"Of course. Though, Daniel, I was wondering. Has anything happened, you seem different somehow." Vlad said, putting his hands together and tilting his head slightly._

_Danny turned sharply to look at him hard for a moment before turning away._

_"I'm fine."_

Dark scowled up at the mirror showing what was happening in Dannys world. He didn't like this development one bit. He had his suspicions that part of how he felt about Danny was a thing he had picked up from Vlad. Vlad was a slight narcissist himself and Dark suspected that he also had an unhealthy 'interest' in his younger self that had merged with his mentality as well.

He didn't want anyone else touching his property, and if the older man did anything to his younger self he wouldn't hesitate (not like he ever did) to kill him.

A cough meant to catch his attention drew his eyes off the screen and to the ghost floating next to him.

"What is it?" Dark growled, glaring at the ghost.

Clockworks mouth pulled in what might have been called a smile and said, "Now now, there's no need to rush. Though we have much to discuss at length right now we have all the time in the world."

xXx

End Chapter Five


	6. Party

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Valerie and Danny go to the party where they unexpectedly encounter Dark, whom Val still doesn't know who is or what he's done. Jazz get's worried and follows Danny. Danny gets intoxicated and is accosted by Dark, and Dash gets slightly traumatized.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings: Very dubcon Sex. Drug mentions and implied use, underage drinking.

Vlad frowned as he walked along the streets of Amity Park. He had snuck out of Danny's room when it had seemed the boy was asleep and now he was aimlessly wandering the town.

He was thinking about Danny, not that that was unusual, but he was more concerned than normal. He seemed less like the determined teenager who would do anything to stop his 'evil plans' and more...scarred. He was jumpy, like something had happened to him, or like he had seen something that _no one_ was supposed to see, let alone someone that young. Vlad didn't like it one bit. He was also curious about the way Jazz was acting toward him like he had done something wrong.

Danny's parents seemed oblivious as usual to things that seemed obvious to everyone else and that angered Vlad. What kind of parents could _not_ see that something strange was going on with their son? He could see how they may have missed Danny becoming a Halfa, the boy could be very sneaky, but for this there were physical signs showing effects of whatever he had gone through.

"But what could have happened to him?" Vlad muttered out loud, not knowing that he was repeating the same question Dannys friends and sister had asked.

He supposed he would just try to take care of him and watch the boy. After all he did care about him and didn't want anything to happen to him. The boy was too precious.

xXx

Floating a good distance above Vlad Dark glowered down at the older man. If he had his way he would have killed him when he got back from talking to Clockwork, but no, he couldn't now. At least unless he attacked him first.

Dark was really hoping that happened.

Dark watched as Vlad walked around a corner and out of sight before huffing and flying somewhere to think about all that he and Clockwork had talked about.

xXx

_"What do you mean we have things to talk about?" Dark scowled at the ghost in front of him._

_"Now now, no need to be hasty. After all, I could freeze you right now and have you back in the thermos before you knew what was happening," he said and Dark scowled but stayed silent, knowing the truth in his words. "Good. Now I can tell you why I brought you here and why you're out of the thermos."_

_Dark raised an eyebrow. "You did this on purpose? I had assumed this was an accident. A fortunate accident on my part, but one none the less."_

_"I don't_ do _accidents," Clockwork hissed though it was almost ruined by the fact his body had taken that moment to revert to child form. "I'm doing this for Danny's good as well as your own."_

_"It's for Danny's own good for me to be sexually harassing him?" Dark laughed, "Well if I had known that earlier I wouldn't have wasted any time the first time I saw him."_

_Clockwork ignored Darks comments and went on as if nothing had happened. "If Danny had gone down the path that was set before him without you there he would end up becoming something worse than you. Not in the way that he would become evil and kill everyone, but he would live a life of regret. Growing old before his time and blaming things on himself. A dead man walking if you know what I mean."_

_"So how is this 'better'?" Dark asked. Though he didn't exactly have feelings any more, especially those of pity or sympathy, he couldn't see how this could be 'good' or 'better' for his younger self._

_"You will see in time." Clockwork said cryptically and Dark resisted the urge to roll his eyes. "One more thing. You may not attack Vlad unless he does something to aggravate you first._ Physically _aggravate you. You may not kill him because you are jealous of Danny's parents making him stay with your 'possession.'" as he said that his face twitched as if the words tasted sour, "Now go. I know you have things to do and I do as well."_

_With a wave of his staff Dark was knocked back through the portal and into Amity Park._

xXx

"Hey, Danny!"

Danny turned and saw Valerie waving frantically at him. He motioned to his friends that he would be a second and walked over to her.

"Yeah, Val?" he asked, glancing at his friends who looked suspicious and seemed impatient for him to get back to them. They had been acting weird since the day before, as if they were expecting something from him.

She leaned closer and glanced around before whispering, "It's the party. Star said she could get us in, she seemed surprised that you were going to be there too, but she said she would meet us at the door anyway so Dash doesn't try anything." she said quickly and when Danny just gave her a look she realized she had forgotten vital information. "Oh yeah, it's on Friday. If you could meet me at the park at nine that would be great."

"Yeah, I can make it. It might be a little difficult to sneak out since someones staying with us right now but I'll work it out." Danny said back, shrugging.

"Ok well as long as you can make it gotta go bye." Valerie said quickly, the last few words practically blurring together and Danny frowned at the abrupt end of the conversation until a shadow appeared over him.

"Wonderful," Danny muttered, too quiet for Dash to hear him, and turned around. "What do you want, Dash?" Danny asked bluntly and Dash looked slightly put back at the bluntness Danny used but quickly regained his footing.

"See you made it today. Not too busy skipping or hurling in the hall." Dash said and his minions laughed as if on cue. It probably was.

Trying to keep a straight face Danny retorted, "Whatever. Are you done? I need to get to class."

Ignoring all the looks being sent his way Danny walked back to his friends and after pausing for a minute they all walked away too.

xXx

"I don't understand why he's not saying anything!" Sam exclaimed as she and Tucker sat in the theater under her house.

Tucker sighed, "I don't either, maybe he thinks we won't like him any more or something."

"Why would he think that?" Sam asked and Tucker shrugged.

"Do I look like I can read minds to you?"

Sam chuckled lightly for a second before saying, "No, definitely not and if you could I would be frightened." she then paused for a second, "He seems to be talking to Valerie more too."

"Yeah, and I've heard rumors of a party. What if he's going?"

"Without telling us? I don't think so." Sam said and Tucker made a noncommittal sound.

"Look Sam, you have to start understanding that Danny can keep secrets. It's become pretty obvious lately. If he can keep something as big as getting raped, if that's what really happened, a secret, then why would not saying he's going to a party be that big of a stretch?"

Sam flopped down in the chair next to Tucker and sighed. "I'm not sure. I just hope everything turns out ok."

xXx

Friday night Danny stood at the park waiting for Valerie. After what had happened with Dash Danny's friends had been asking even more questions than normal and it was really starting to get on his nerves. It didn't help that he was admittedly a little high strung due to the fact that he hadn't heard anything from Dark since what had happened.

Vlad had also been frustrating him. Though the man had said that he would spend as little time as possible in Danny's room he still seemed to be watching him or following him around at his house. He was leaving on Sunday and Danny hoped that was the last time he saw him for awhile. He was almost glad to be out of the house and somewhere Vlad couldn't follow him.

Danny was pulled out of his thoughts by Valerie calling out to him as she jogged up. "Sorry I was late," she panted, "My dad kept me a little longer than I thought he would. Really, he should trust me by now." she rolled her eyes and Danny grinned.

"It's fine, I think I was a little early anyway." he paused, looking at her a little more closely. "You look nice."

Valerie blushed slightly. She was wearing a low cut blank tank top with a silver logo of some abstract brand on it with a short black skirt and boots that came almost up to her knees with a slight heel. She had on a silver necklace with a dragon and a matching bracelet too.

"Thanks, you do too." and Danny shrugged.

He had pulled out some of his _own_ black pants and a white shirt with a small but intricate design on it. He also wore a wrist band with the insignia of a popular band. His hair wasn't spiked, which was becoming normal lately, but he looked like he had been getting a little more sleep.

They started walking in silence for awhile and a little before they got to Dash's house Valerie stuck out a hand grabbing Danny's arm. She winced when he immediately flinched and pulled back and they looked apologetically at each other for a second before she spoke.

"Look, are you sure you want to come to this party? I mean, after what happened. I'm sure it's going to be kind of crazy but it may be good for you to kind of relax. I mean..." she trailed off, looking toward the house before looking back at Danny.

"It's fine. I'm sure," Danny said, though it almost sounded as if he was trying to convince himself. For some reason he had started to get a bad feeling about the party. "If I decided I didn't want to come I wouldn't have shown up."

"I just wanted to be sure. I don't want to pressure you into something you don't want to do." she said and then mentally winced. Valerie really hoped that that didn't trigger something and make him go depressed or manic.

Danny laughed helplessly, "No. You couldn't. No one but..." he trailed off, his eyes glazing over for a second before he caught himself and shook his head. "I'm sure. Let's go party."

xXx

Dash stood in his kitchen, watching the party move around him. His parents had left that morning and weren't going to be back until Monday night so even if the house got trashed he still had plenty of time to have people clean up. It was almost ten so most of the people were already there setting the pre-party atmosphere.

The petty mingling was almost over and as someone cranked up the stereo Dash knew that it was about time for things to really get started. A few people moved into the living room to dance while others took a detour to the table to grab a drink before doing whatever else they were going to do.

Dark had stopped by earlier to drop off some drinks and said he would be back later. He had said he would buy more drinks, but had things he needed to do before that. Dash hoped he got back soon, it had been a long time since he had hosted a party and had forgotten how much people drank.

Kwan had wandered off somewhere with Star, and Dash thought darkly that they were probably meeting Valerie and Fenton to get them in. He still had no idea why he was letting them come.

Actually, he did know. It was because when he had mentioned the stupidity of it in front of Dark, Dark had suggested that he let them come. When Dash had protested and asked why Dark had just smirked at him, something Dash was quickly growing used to, and said that it might make things more interesting. The teen still had no idea how it might make things 'interesting' but he had agreed, not wanting to lose his supplier.

"I'm back."

Dash flinched violently and spun around to see Dark leaning on the wall, the bags he must have been holding already on the table. He was wearing punk-ish attire, but there was still something that seemed expensive about it. Dash nodded at him and Dark walked into the living room.

He wasn't as conspicuous as someone thinking of a 'high school' party would have thought. He looked barely older than some of the seniors and some of the other popular kids had people they knew at college who had come as well.

Finally deciding to come out of the kitchen Dash moved to the larger room as well and scowled as he saw Danny and Valerie walk in, Valerie talking casually with Star. He made a disgruntled sound and decided to go over and 'greet' them.

"Hey Fenton, I'm glad you made it. Be sure to provide me with some nice blackmail material ok?"

Danny sighed and rolled his eyes, ignoring the comment. That was just Dash being Dash. He was more concerned about what Star had been saying before she had been interrupted. She had been saying that it was weird that they had been able to come, and some weird older guy was the one who had convinced Dash to let them come.

When she had said that Danny's stomach had dropped, but he had tried to mentally laugh it off telling himself he was being paranoid.

"Same goes to you." Danny replied to Dash with a shrug and he could see that the comment had made the other boy angry. He wasn't sure what had come over him recently when dealing with Dash. It was probably because he had other things to deal with instead of human bullies who, honestly, were becoming kind of cliché and out of style.

"You-" Dash bit out and Danny had a feeling he was about to be punched.

"Well what do we have here? Dash, do you really want to ruin your party so soon?" a deep familiar voice said and Danny could have sworn it was directly behind his ear.

He didn't want to move. He couldn't move. Really, he was sure the universe was conspiring against him.

Dash immediately dropped his fist as the older man walked around Danny to stand beside him. Danny swallowed and tried to regain his composure. He could feel Valerie looking at him oddly and he closed his eyes for a moment, trying to pass it off as a relieved breath from not being punched.

"No, and it wouldn't have ruined it. No one would have cared if I punched out a nerd." Dash said, shrugging.

Valerie shifted from foot to foot for a second before asking, "Uh, Dash? Who's that?"

Dash glared at her for a second before saying, "His name's Dark."

"Uh-huh." Valerie said, suspecting that's all that Dash knew, all that anyone knew, about the mysterious older male.

"Those two are Valerie and Fen- I mean, Danny." Dash said and made a face as he was forced to say Danny's first name.

"A pleasure." Dark said with a smile and Valerie shivered at the way he was looking at them, and especially Danny.

"I-uh, hi." Danny managed to say and took a step back grabbing onto Valeries wrist for a second and tugging at her before letting go. "Well, I'm going to go walk around, maybe I'll see you around." he said before fleeing into the crowd.

Dark's smile was predatory as he watched the two teens disappear into the crowd. He had been slightly surprised when Dash had told him that Danny wanted to come to the party, but then he had immediately begun planning things.

Originally he was just going to be at the party for kicks and because he was trying to figure out something big to erase the progress his younger self was trying to make, but now...

He laughed and Dash looked at him strangely. Dark just shook his head and disappeared into the crowd as well.

xXx

Danny had somehow made it through the mass of people and into a hallway. The music wasn't as loud and while there were still people there was no one he recognized. He leaned against the wall for a moment before sliding down it, his head in his hands.

Somehow he had lost Valerie while he moved through the waves of people, but right now he didn't really mind. He would find her later. Right now he just had to get his thoughts together.

Would he leave the party? Try to hide the whole night? Try and forget that his evil older self was here? He didn't know.

Sighing, Danny raised his head and was startled to see one of the older teens standing in front of him with a huge smile on his face. Unconsciously curling up a little tighter Danny said, "Yes?"

"You're looking a little down," the teen said and Danny frowned. Something was off with this person, like they were maybe too happy. "You should take this if you wanna be happy." the teen set something on Danny's knee before walking, well, more like almost stumbling, away.

"Ok, that was weird," Danny muttered and picked up the pill. It was small and white, with a dove carrying a small 'e' in it's mouth. Even with his severely limited knowledge Danny knew it must be some sort of drug. He made a face and was going to set it down next to him or throw it down the hall when Valerie suddenly appeared.

"Danny, I finally found you!" she exclaimed and Danny slipped the pill into his pocket automatically, "I was worried about you!"

Danny stood up and brushed off his pants, "Yeah, well I'm here and I'm fine." Valerie nodded and looked as if she wanted to say something, "Well, what kind of 'party like' things are we supposed to be doing anyway?"

Valerie huffed out a breath and said, "Ok, I know you didn't really want to say that. I want to know what's going on. When you saw that Dark person you looked like you were going to pass out." Danny winced, "Do you know him?"

"No, not really," Danny muttered, trying to think of some plausible lie to say, "He just reminds me of someone."

Valerie nodded but still looked suspicious. "Danny, you know you can tell me anything. I mean, you already told me…" she trailed off with a meaningful look, "I promise it'll be fine."

Danny sighed and ran a hand through his hair, thinking how people had been saying that to him a lot lately and said, "Look, it's fine. I'm fine, it'll be fine. And if it's not, well, I'll figure that out when it happens." he shrugged, "Really though, let's get back to the party."

xXx

An hour later the party was in full swing, the music louder than ever, most of the kids there drunk or at least close to it, and pretty much the whole house had become a dance floor of some sort.

Someone had been handing Danny drinks, and even though the first time he had taken a drink he had almost spit it out he had then realized that maybe it would make him forget about what was really going on. That's why other people drank, right? To make them forget.

He had just finished his third bottle and he was feeling a little light-headed. He wasn't staggering around like some of the other teens, but it was obvious he was getting close to his limit. Danny thought Valerie had managed to get her hands on a couple bottles, but wasn't drinking as much as Danny. He figured she was trying to 'protect' him now.

Danny made his way out of the crowd and leaned on the wall, trying to catch his breath. Though normally he wasn't a very good dancer with all these people around to imitate and not exactly being himself he was actually getting better at it. Probably part of the reason he wasn't freaking out at all the people bumping into him and occasionally rubbing on him was the fact that he had had maybe a bit too much to drink.

Opening his eyes, he didn't realized he had closed them in the first place, he barely managed not to yelp when Dark was standing right in front of his face.

"Hello Daniel." Dark said and Danny leaned more into the wall, "I see you've been having fun. You may have actually forgotten about me for a bit so I decided a bit of a reminder was in order."

Danny swallowed and tried to glance around to see if anyone noticed what was going on. Naturally it seemed as if no one had a clue. "Why are you here?" he finally asked, turning back to Dark.

"I could as you the same thing. Honestly I never thought I would see myself at a party. We were more the 'stay home and play video games' type. I wonder what changed?" he said in mock curiosity tapping a finger against his chin in thought.

Danny surprised himself by letting out a low growl that made Dark lean back and laugh for a second. "Ah, I had forgotten you still think you can defy me." Danny frowned at him and made a 'keh' sound. "I'm sure there are places around here for you to learn your lesson."

"What?" Danny asked, frozen in shock for a minute, "You can't be serious. You won't. You can't."

Dark chuckled at the stuttering boy in front of him. "Of course I can, and I _will_. There's nothing you can do, as I've said before. I could explain right here _every detail_ of what I'm going to do to you and you would still be completely helpless."

"I could get someone's attention. I could walk away and you would have to let me unless you wanted to make a scene. Aren't you supposed to be taking over my world subtly instead of the over-the-top way you were in your reality. Killing everyone and blasting cities to dust?"

Dark shrugged and said blandly, "I could change my mind."

Danny shook his head and mouthed 'no', making Dark smile. He knew just how to twist his younger self. That was why when he turned and started walking he knew Danny was right behind him.

xXx

Jazz stood in front of Dash's house, looking between her detecting device and it. She had no idea what Danny was doing there. Why would he be at a party? He had never seemed like the type to go out and party.

The same thing could be said about Jazz too, honestly, but she had snuck out a couple times before. She had decided she didn't really enjoy them as much as other people so she didn't go any more, but she still knew what was going on in there. Lots of underage drinking, drug use, dancing, and probably sex in a few quiet places in the house.

Jazz made a face, again wondering what had possessed her brother to come to a place like this, especially since it seemed _Dash_ was hosting it.

Sighing and brushing her hair out of her face, she had decided to leave her headband at home to try and fit in more, she tugged at the hem of her short black dress, shifting in her heels before walking up the front porch.

"Yo Jazz, haven't seen you at one of these in awhile." some random person came up to her and handed her a drink which she saw no other option to do but take it.

"Yeah, I decided I needed a bit of a break from my goody-goody, smart girl image," she said smoothly. She had tried to practice doing things like this earlier, and it seemed it actually worked.

The boy chuckled and said, "Good. Well, have fun." he said and started to walk off before he stopped, "Wait, I thought I saw your brother here earlier. It seems like partying runs in the family." he laughed again. "Cool."

Jazz tried to laugh with him though her heart sank. She had half been hoping that the device was wrong and Danny wasn't here. She made a couple more exchanges of small talk before he walked off for real.

When she was alone she frowned, looking around the room and mumbling, "Oh Danny, I wish you would tell me what's going on."

xXx

Dash frowned, wondering what he should do. He had seen part of what had happened between Dark and Fenton, and now he was curious. When he had first introduced Dark to him Fenton had seemed as if he knew him, but Dark hadn't said anything.

He wavered between following them to see what was going on and not following them and enjoying his party. Finally the potential for blackmail won over and he excused himself and slipped down the hall after them. Not finding them there he went upstairs to check there too.

He almost gave up wondering if he was just delusional, but paused when he heard a thump and small crashing sound from the bathroom at the end of the hall. Frowning again, he hoped if there was a fight none of his parents important things were being broken, he tried to stealthily make his way to listen at the door.

"-again. Also about that, telling me what to do didn't work very well the first time." Dash was startled by the shift in Dark's voice. It seemed different, evil somehow.

"No, you can't." Danny said and Dash was startled by his tone of voice. Desperate and determined were the two things he could immediately hear, but there was also a tinge of fear. "If...not here."

Dark laughed and Dash flinched back. He sounded insane. What kind of person had he just tried to befriend?

"Danny, Danny. What have I told you about you assuming things and telling me what to do. You can't. There is _nothing you can do_." There was the sound of a struggle for a couple seconds before Danny yelped.

"No," Danny whispered and Dash could barely hear him, but had no trouble missing his exclamation of "Stop!"

Swallowing nervously Dash backed up. He didn't want to hear any more. Whatever the youngest Fenton had gotten himself into Dash didn't want to hear any more of it. More, he was afraid of what Dark could do if he found out that Dash had been listening.

Hurrying back down to the main party Dash tried to forget about what he head heard and pretend everything was the same as before that had happened.

xXx

Danny followed Dark into the second floor bathroom. He noticed that it was the farthest room away from the main party and even with that the music was still loud. He doubted if he screamed anyone would hear and if they did they would just assume it was a joke or part of the music.

He swallowed as Dark locked the door and turned around to look at him. Again he felt as if he was being eaten alive by the man in front of him, molested with his eyes. Shifting nervously from foot to foot he wondered what was going to happen.

Actually Danny had a sinking feeling he knew what was going to happen. Dark had been hinting at it downstairs, and even a couple nights ago he had made a few insinuations to it. Danny wished he was wrong, but when it came to guessing what his older self wanted to do to him when it came to things of a sexual nature Danny was developing a sort of intuition about it.

'Oh please, not again. I was just starting to get better,' Danny pleaded inside his head, "This _can't_ become a regular occurrence. It can't." and only after the words were out of his mouth he realized he had said it out loud and Dark was smirking at him.

"If I had my way it would become regular. Every day, Danny, no time for you to try and be yourself again. Also about that, telling me what to do didn't work very well the first time." Dark moved toward Danny, trapping him against the wall.

Now that he thought about it the bathroom was really quite big, a small part of Danny's brain rambled trying to distract him from the man closing in on him. 

"No, you can't." Danny trembled a little. "If...not here."

Danny winced at Dark's laughter, knowing the man was going to ignore him. He didn't even listen as he was 'chastised' about trying to tell him what to do again and since he was ignoring him he didn't notice him reach out to grab him. He flailed for a second and a bottle on the counter fell down and it distracted Danny long enough for Dark to take his shirt off making him yelp.

Dark pushed him against the wall and moved one cold hand to his chest, one finger moving in small circles. He leaned down so he was level with Danny's neck and bit down making Danny protest, "No..."

Danny sucked in a breath when Dark squeezed a nipple then the hand moved suddenly down. Swiftly undoing Danny's pants he put his hand in them and rubbed against Danny's crotch causing him to exclaim, "Stop!"

Sighing in mock disappointment Dark shook his head and tsk'd. "But Danny, you already know you can't get me to stop, and we both know you enjoy this."

"I-I don't. You make me, I don't-Ah!" Danny's protests were cut off as Dark grabbed the limp flesh between his legs and began working it to hardness.

As was becoming usual Danny's protests were ignored as his body reacted to the stimuli. He shut his mouth as one of his cries to stop dissolved into a moan. He didn't want Dark to hear him, didn't want him to think he was _consenting_ to anything that was happening. Just because his body made him physically like it didn't mean that he had to accept it mentally.

Though he supposed that would make things easier.

Danny's eyes widened in shock at that unexpected thought. He was not going to give in to what Dark was doing to him.

He was so distracted that he didn't notice Dark let go of him and was completely unprepared when Dark ripped off his pants. Luckily for him this time it was only figurative instead of literal.

xXx

Dark was becoming annoyed. He knew that he was making his younger self feel good, and yet he was still protesting. It almost made Dark want to show him how considerate he was being. Maybe he would some other time though.

He needed to hurry up or else someone would come looking for Danny and he had decided he wanted this charade to last at least a little bit longer. As he pulled off Danny's pants he heard a slight tap as something fell out of Danny's pocket.

Curious, he looked around trying to find the source of the noise. He didn't bother restraining Danny because it looked like he had gotten wrapped up in his thoughts again. Locating what had fallen he reached out and grabbed the small white thing, picking it up to examine it. When he recognized it he smiled.

"Ecstasy. How interesting. How did you manage to come across this?" Dark chuckled, drawing Danny back to him.

"What?" Danny asked blankly and Dark smirked. So he hadn't known what it was. He couldn't say that he was surprised, he had been quite naïve when he was younger.

"You'll find out." he said, pocketing the pill. He figured he could have some fun with that later.

Danny was sure he didn't want to find out later, but that was pushed from his mind with the progression of the immediate situation. He noticed that Dark had already thrown his pants somewhere and was pulling off Danny's boxers. When Danny put a hand down to grab them to stop it Dark looked up at him and Danny shrank away at the look in his eyes.

"Why do you seem in such a hurry?" Danny blurted out, not even realizing he had been about to ask a question. He immediately put his hands over his mouth and winced.

"You mean you want me to take my sweet time and make people suspicious so they come look for you to find you having sex with an older male?" when Danny blanched Dark sighed, "Do you ever look in the future for potential consequences of your actions?"

"And you do?" Danny asked instead of answering the question Dark should have known the answer to anyway.

"I do now," he muttered and Danny would have began questioning him on that if Dark had given him enough time. Instead he just ended up gasping as Dark suddenly put two fingers into him.

Wincing at the sudden intrusion and pain Danny squirmed, or tried to, as Dark held him down. He couldn't help himself from making small noises whenever Dark did something his body sensed as pleasurable and tried to bite his lip.

Dark sighed and Danny looked at him oddly as he withdrew his fingers. He seemed different at this encounter. As if he was not enjoying it as much, or had something else on his mind. What could have put the ghost off so much though, Danny wondered with a mental frown.

'Maybe it's because I'm not screaming at him to stop,' Danny thought, and it was soon followed by another mental flash. ' _Why_ am I not screaming at him to stop, anyway?' he decided he would wonder that later, but for now he ended up gasping and arching in pain when Dark put in three fingers, and after the minimal preparation of the two and now this Danny was _not_ looking forward to(not like he ever would be) what was going to happen next.

"There are so many things you don't know, Danny." Dark said as he undid his pants and positioned himself. He stroked down the side of his face as he spoke, "Things you'll learn, things I'll tell you, teach you. Then things you will find out and wish you never knew about."

"What are you talking about?" Danny asked, or tried to but it was cut off in the middle by Dark pushing in causing Danny to arch and his eyes to roll back in his head as he gasped in pain.

It had hurt the first time. Hurt more than anything else Danny had ever known. The pain was so intrusive, invasive, _abnormal_ and nothing Danny could have thought about doing would have changed it from being that way. This time seemed ten times worse though.

Dannys breathing was erratic, if you could call it breathing in the normal sense. It consisted mostly of taking small gasps of air and holding his breath to try and ignore the pain before he was forced to let it out. He whimpered as the breath left him, waiting a few seconds before taking in more air. Danny swallowed and gasped, speechless with pain and tears prickling at his eyes when Dark shifted.

Grabbing Danny's waning erection he began to stroke it softly and making the boy relax a little though he was still almost unbearable tight. Danny's breathing slowly became more normal and when Dark moved again the only reaction Danny had was to suck in a breath and arch slightly.

Taking that as some sort of twisted sign that Danny was 'ready' Dark began to slowly move.

xXx

Danny couldn't believe this was happening again. Didn't want to believe it was happening again. He was having sex forced upon him by his evil older self and he(he didn't bother to refer to it as 'his body') was enjoying it. Again.

It still hurt, but somehow in some way he didn't understand it almost made it better. Adding it to the list of things he would think about later when he was actually able to _think_ Danny instead focused outwardly again on what was happening to him.

He had managed to relax a little and Dark was managing to hit that _thing_ from last time and Danny was having a hard time keeping himself silent. He knew Dark enjoyed making him make any noise, whether it was pleasure, pain, distress, or annoyance. Anything other than ignoring him was welcomed. Danny should have thought that his silence would come with consequences though. He flinched as his face was slapped forcing a cheek against the tile floor.

"What?" he glared back up at Dark who shook his head. Danny knew what he meant by the slap though. It was a cry for attention, a 'pay attention to me and what I'm doing to you' type of thing.

He bit back a snort and Dark narrowed his eyes and drew back quickly, slamming into him making him rock back and knock his head on the bathtub. Having a horrible feeling of déjà vu Danny's head lolled to the side as he tried to regain his bearings. It wasn't helping that though some of his buzz had worn off, been shocked off when he had seen Dark again, his head was still fuzzy anyway.

Danny put his hands on Darks shoulders to try and push him away and instead ended up tightening his grip and almost pulling him to him when the other male thrust back in making him gasp and arch.

Dark smirked as he did that again, watching any of the willpower Danny was using to try and not enjoy it crumple. What he really wanted was to have Danny beg, but he knew that wasn't going to happen this time.

Finally Danny's willpower cracked and he began emitting little 'ahs' and 'ohs' when Dark moved. Smirking the older man grabbed the erection between the boys legs and began pumping that as well.

He knew that the younger boy wouldn't last long so he wasn't surprised when after a minute Danny gasped and arched up with a(completely unintentional) cry of 'Dark!'

Pleased that he had been able to get his younger self to do as much as that Dark thrust a few more times into Danny before he came as well.

xXx

Jazz could not find Danny anywhere. She had looked all over the bottom floor and located Valerie, but there was still no sign of her brother. A few minutes ago Dash had come downstairs looking slightly pale and grabbed a drink, disappearing into the kitchen. She had been curious at the time but her need to find her brother had outweighed the urge to go psycho-analyze him.

Now though, maybe the reason he had been so pale was because he had seen her brother. She almost laughed it off, thinking she must be paranoid, not everything that went bad in the world was connected to her brother, but still...

She found Valerie and told her to keep looking on the bottom floor while she went upstairs. Shifting on her feet a couple seconds she decided to take off her heels in case she needed to run, and also because they were getting decidedly uncomfortable. Depositing them in a safe spot she quickly and quietly went upstairs. A quick glance told her no one was in the hall, so she slowly crept down the hallway, listening at every door on her way down. She thought it was weird that nobody was up here. Usually at least a few people would be up here, doing things that they wanted to be away from other people to do.

When she got toward the last door in the hall she started hearing noises. At first she thought it may have been the music, but then she got closer and the sounds began to get clearer.

Someone was panting loudly and making whimpering and pleading noises. There was someone else too, making less noise, but the groans in time with the other person told her exactly what they were doing. Blushing, Jazz backed up a couple steps before she stopped herself.

What if it was Danny in there? And if it was, who was he with? Jazz swallowed and frowned, nervous and curious at the same time. She didn't want to try the handle, both because she didn't know what would happen and also if the door was unlocked she didn't exactly want to see what was going on in there.

After a few moments the sounds got louder and Jazz heard someone, _Danny_ , gasp and cry out a name that Jazz couldn't quite understand other than it started with a 'D'.

She backed up a few steps again, and mentally gasped. 'Oh Danny! No!' and not wanting to hear the rest of it, and also not wanting to be there when someone came out she rushed back downstairs.

This was the last straw, Jazz thought as she worked her way back through the crowd to find Valerie. She was confronting her brother with everything she had, and she _would_ get him to tell her what was happening.

xXx

End Chapter Six


	7. Speak

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vlad wants some answers and Jazz finally gets hers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings: Drug use and mental breakdowns. Also excessive(?) use of hyphens, commas, ellipsis, and italics.
> 
> Also, I love this chapter the most except for the last one. Mental breakdowns are my favorite.

Danny couldn't move. He couldn't bring himself to move. All he could do was lay there on the floor of the bathroom and watch as Dark stood up. He didn't move as Dark fixed his pants and knelt back down. Danny didn't even flinch as lips were pressed against his in a deceptively gentle kiss before the other man stood up and walked through the door.

Danny almost chuckled as he thought about how literal that last statement had been. Dark hadn't even bothered to open the door, instead just phasing through it like it was nothing, which it really was.

That thought had him chuckle out loud and he startled himself with the noise. He then got over it and began laughing at himself for being so jumpy. Thinking about the situation and how he was lying on the floor of a bathroom in _Dash Baxter's_ house made him laugh even harder. Danny then thought to the events that had led to him laying on said floor.

A hiccuping sob worked it's way into the laugh, and that made Danny let out a breathless little giggle. Suddenly everything flat-lined in Danny's head and he started laughing hysterically, sobs working their way through his laughter causing him to come close to hyperventilation. Curling on his side he continued to laugh, not able to stop.

Somewhere in the back of his mind a voice was telling him that he had to get himself together, that he was going into something akin to shock and he had to snap out of it. He couldn't though. His breathing was becoming more irregular and he couldn't stop laughing. Danny was slowly suffocating himself with laughter and the realization of that only made it worse, the sudden panic making him tense and air wouldn't come into his lungs.

Slowly the laughter diminished to panicked gasps, tears streaking down his cheeks. His head ached and he couldn't think. Darkness swam at the edges of his vision and his lungs burned.

Finally Danny lay on the floor of the bathroom trembling, short gasps consisting of not enough air coming through his lips as finally everything faded to black.

xXx

"Yo Dash, where you been?" Kwan asked, throwing an arm around Dash's shoulders.

Dash made a face at the normally timid teen and could smell the alcohol on his breath. Throwing his friends arm off he vaguely said, "Around."

"Well you shoulda been 'around' with me and Star. We've been having a great time." he chuckled and Dash frowned at him, his mind still other places. Such as upstairs.

"Sure, whatever." he said and Kwan finally seemed to realize something was off with him.

"What's wrong with you?" he asked, fighting his way through his drunken haze to try and figure out what was strange.

"Nothing, just a few misunderstandings," was all Dash said and Kwan raised and eyebrow before shrugging.

He backed up a couple paces and put his hands up in a defensive gesture, "Ok then, but be sure and come hang with us, yeah?" he said and Dash nodded vaguely making Kwan flash him a grin and stagger off.

Dash leaned against the wall, grabbing another drink though he really didn't feel like it. He just felt like he should be holding something. Thinking about what he had heard upstairs he frowned again and took a drink, almost hoping that he would get piss drunk stupid enough to forget it and he could live the rest of his days in bullying peace.

His hopes crumbled as one of the objects of the thoughts he was trying to rid himself of leaned next to him on the wall. Trying to act normal Dash pushed himself off the wall and stretched, looking over at him.

"So where have you been?" he attempted to ask nonchalantly.

"Elsewhere." Dark said and Dash mentally winced, "It seems you're not enjoying yourself very much."

Flinching minutely Dash said, "Yeah, well I guess I'm tired. Being a host is more difficult than I remember." Dark made an acknowledging noise and Dash nearly sighed with relief.

"Well I wanted to tell you that I'm leaving, I have other things to do." Dark said startling Dash.

"You what?" he asked stupidly and Dark smirked at him.

"I may be back later. I may not. Don't worry, I'm sure you'll see me again." Dark chuckled and waved as he walked out the door.

Dash almost wanted to call out to him to wait or not go or explain what he was doing. He almost wanted to ask him what exactly he was doing with Fenton upstairs. He almost wanted to ask where he was going, or better yet, where he came from.

He didn't though, and for some reason he had a feeling it was better that he was left in the dark.

xXx

_"I want you to take away my emotions, my ghost half."_ Danny frowned as he heard that. It sounded like him.

_"Are you sure, this will be very painful. I'm not sure what will happen."_

Danny stirred, opening his eyes. That sounded like Vlad. What was Vlad doing here? Where was he anyway. He tried to look around, but realized he couldn't. For a minute he panicked before he registered what he was really seeing.

He sat in an office in Vlad's mansion, across from the older man. Vlad looked terrible, like something horrible had just happened.

_"I'm sure."_ Danny frowned as he realized the words were coming out of his mouth. But what...? _"I don't want to have to live feeling like this. Knowing it's my fault...my fault they..."_ he sniffed and put a hand up to his mouth, trembling.

_"It's not your fault they died, Daniel."_ Vlad said, sounding forceful and with a start Danny realized what was going on.

He was in a memory. One of Dark's memories. It was from his reality when he hadn't been able to save his family and friends from the Nasty Burger explosion. Danny figured that he must be watching it through his eyes, though he wasn't sure why this was happening.

The alternate Danny shook his head and Vlad sighed. _"All right, if you're sure we'll go down to the lab."_

There was a flash and Danny was confused for a minute before he discovered they must have moved forward in time a little bit. He was strapped to a surgical table tilted up so he would have been almost standing. Vlad was walking toward him with the Ghost Gauntlets and Danny mentally cringed. He didn't want to see this.

The future Vlad hadn't told him what Dark had done to his body after everything, but he guessed he would be finding out soon whether he wanted to or not. Suddenly a scream, his scream, filled the room becoming two-toned as if both his human and ghost half were screaming. After a second he felt the body fall limp, not quite unconscious and was able to see his ghost half grab the Gauntlets from Vlad and use them to rip out his ghost half.

Both versions of Vlad screamed and the human half fainted as Dan pulled Vlads ghost half to him, merging with him. There was mostly silence in the lab for a short while, the only sounds were that of heavy breathing. Dan shuddered and suddenly his hair changed, turning into a white flame and his body changed, turning a greenish color with sharp teeth, pointy ears and _that tongue._

Somehow Danny's human half had managed to get off of the table and was cowering next to the wall. Dan stalked up to him and Danny could see him through his human selves eyes. He was terrified. Maybe even more than he had been at that moment. This was the moment that had changed him forever. Not just the merging of his and Vlads ghost selves, but the actual act of _murder_ that Danny was sure he was about to preform.

He surprised him by not killing him immediately though.

_"You! You did this!"_ Dan yelled and grabbed Danny by the collar, jerking him up so they were eye to eye. _"You made me do this! Why-how could you be so selfish!"_

_"I didn't mean-"_ Danny's human half started but was cut off by being flung back to the wall and Danny winced as he heard the crack of his skull bouncing off the stone. His vision became fuzzy for a moment and when he looked up Dan was standing in front of him.

_"It didn't have to be like this."_ Dan sighed, looking downcast. He knelt down and embraced his human self. Danny could feel his body tense and a tear fell from his eye.

Dan stood back up, and so did Danny. He supposed it was natural that he would like to face his demise standing.

Shaking, he opened his mouth to utter the last two words he would ever say, and didn't have time to be surprised that Dan echoed him before a blast of energy made a hole in his chest.

_"I'm sorry."_

xXx

Danny woke with a start, one hand flying to his chest before he even realized it. After a second he got everything sorted out and his panic decreased a little bit.

"What was that?" he muttered to himself, shaken. That was not at all what he had been expecting when he tried to imagine what had happened when Dark had killed his human half in his reality.

He shook his head, his thoughts of Dark reminding him what had just happened. Danny figured he must have passed out after having a panic attack when Dark was through with him.

Danny winced at that last thought. That was it though, there was no other words to describe why he left other than those. Dark decided what he wanted to do with Danny, used him accordingly, and left when the use was over. Danny sniffled again but refused to go into another episode.

Finally fully realizing he was still naked Danny made a face and retrieved his clothes, wincing at the pain when he moved. As he put back on his clothes he tried to get his thoughts in order.

What was he going to do when he went back downstairs? He couldn't leave without telling Valerie, but there was still the possibility of running into Dark and Danny wasn't sure he could handle that right now. There was also the horrible sense of resignation that had overcome him for a minute when Dark was preparing him earlier. He closed his eyes and let out a deep breath as he let his shirt fall into place. There were so many questions and not enough answers.

Looking into the mirror Danny winced, he looked awful. He figured he couldn't have been out for that long because his eyes were still red and showed signs of tears. He also had a deer-in-the-headlights sort of look which made him wince and stick his tongue out at himself.

Blowing out a breath he walked-not-limped to the door and unlocked it, pushing it open and walked straight into the teen he had seen in the hallway earlier. Danny gasped in shock and jumped backwards, but the teen seemed not to notice.

"Hey, you're still not having fun," he said with a frown and Danny resisted the urge to back up a few more steps and close and lock the bathroom. There was something wrong with this kid.

"I-I'm having fun. I'm having lots of fun." Danny said trying to sound earnest but the boy just tsk'd and shook his head.

"No you're not. Put out your hand."

Danny swallowed, nervous with good reason. If some kid that you suspected might be high or something asked you to put out your hand would you? What if he stabbed him with a needle or something. Danny winced at his thoughts before timidly putting out a hand, hoping he would be able to move in time if some of his more morbid thoughts came true.

Danny flinched when the boy took something out of his pocket, though he still seemed not to notice, and put it in his hand. It was another pill of some sort, still of no kind that Danny knew. He shifted nervously as the teen watched him intently.

"Uhm, I don't really want this," Danny murmured softly and the boy frowned.

"What do you mean you don't want it? Everyone wants _it_ ," he said, his voice raising a bit with a desperate edge making Danny want to bolt again.

Danny swallowed nervously thinking of the random shows he had seen talking about the violence people on drugs could do. He tried to think of something and the best he could come up with was pretending to take it.

He laughed nervously, "O-of course you're right, I want it." he said and that seemed to placate the teen and Danny put the pill in his mouth and under his tongue, pretending to swallow it under the watchful eye of the strange boy in front of him who nodded in approval.

"There, you'll be feeling good now!" the teen gushed and pranced down the hallway.

After a couple seconds Danny breathed a sigh of relief and thought 'Now I can spit it out,' before his sister and Valerie appeared.

xXx

"Danny!" Valerie and Jazz yelled and Jazz frowned as Danny stiffened, swallowed, coughed, and swallowed again slight horror showing on his face for a second before he went back to neutral.

"Valerie...Jazz?" he asked, an incredulous look on his face. "What are you doing here?"

"I was worried about you and we have to talk." she said and frowned as Danny shook his head. It wasn't really an act of defiance so much as something you would see someone trying to clear their head do.

"Well I'm fine now, no reason to talk," Danny said and his voice sounded slightly distracted causing Jazz to frown deeper and Valerie take a step closer. Danny shook his head again and swayed making Valerie and Jazz exchange a glance. What was going on?

Jazz had told Valerie in a quiet rush what she thought she had heard after she found her which had taken a while longer than she had anticipated. Valerie had been horrified and concerned, though she didn't look as surprised as Jazz had thought she would. She had only told the girl because she had heard Danny was hanging out with her more, but what if he had told her before he told them...?

Pulling herself back to the present Jazz put a hand out to Danny's shoulder, making him jump back and crouch against the wall. He seemed to recover himself after a moment and tried to stand back up, staggering a couple times to get back up.

"Danny, have you been drinking?" Jazz asked, not accusing, just curious.

"Yeah, but that's not wha' made me...this's your fault." Danny slurred, sending a half-hearted glare toward them.

The girls exchanged glances again before looking at Danny who blinked and shook his head again. "Uh, what are you talking about?" Valerie asked nervously and Danny blew out a deep breath.

"Crazy kid...some pill, wanted me to take it. _Me_ take some stupid pill. Didn't want to, but _you guys_ jus' _had_ to startle me," Danny rambled, his voice barely audible before he turned up his chin to glare at them again.

Jazz frowned, trying to figure out what he was talking about. Suddenly remembering the kids downstairs in the hall her eyes widened in shock. Danny didn't...? She didn't accidentally make him swallow one he had been hiding had she?

"Don't think this means you'll be getting off easy." Jazz finally said, and Danny laughed.

"Ok then," he said started walking toward the stairs.

Jazz and Valerie shared a look and Jazz said, "Um, Danny, I think I should actually get you home."

"Why?" Danny asked, as if she had just asked the stupidest question in the world, "Wha' would mom and dad do if they saw me like this. I mean, 'm pretty sure tha' pill wasn't aspirin."

"All the more reason to get you out of here," Valerie said, finally getting into to conversation. "We don't know what it was, what if makes you go all weird and crazy." she said and Danny laughed again as if he had some private joke.

"Fine then, let's go. 'S not like I didn't know this party wasn't a good idea in the firs' place."

xXx

They managed to get outside without a lot of trouble much to the sober ones surprise, but now getting home was the hard part. Valerie and Jazz had decided that it took two of them to get Danny moving so she would just stay the night at their house when they got there.

It normally wasn't a very long walk, but at the pace Danny was going...

"Come _on_ Danny!" Jazz exclaimed for what seemed like the millionth time as Danny took an unneeded detour to go sit on the curb. She had thought that she would have some sympathy for her little brother, but honestly right now he was trying her patience. She supposed it was probably whatever he had ingested's fault, but at the time that didn't seem relevant.

"What do we have here?" a voice asked behind her, startling her and making her jump and turn around.

"Vlad!" all three teens cried out and the man wasn't sure whether to look startled or amused.

"It's quite late, why are you out?" Vlad asked, then looked curiously at Danny who he noticed was swaying a bit. "And what's wrong with Daniel?"

Jazz shifted from foot to foot. She wasn't sure how much she should say. Vlad had gone to college, so she was sure he was familiar with parties, but she still didn't want to give away too much. She also thought, maybe on a bit of a selfish note, that with Vlad there he could actually carry Danny and reduce the time of their escapade considerably. It was after midnight after all.

Finally she said, "We were at a party and Danny just got a little messed up." She was sure that Vlad would have asked what kind of 'messed up' Danny supposedly was if not for him pulling the attention to himself by groaning and laying back on the sidewalk.

Valerie rushed over and knelt next to Danny asking what was wrong.

"I feel funny," Danny groaned and put a hand to his forehead and a wave of worry washed over everyone.

There was a moment of slightly awkward silence before Vlad said, "All right, I'll help you home. Don't think I won't inquire about this later though."

xXx

Danny moaned when he was picked up. The world spun a bit and he wondered for a moment when he had gotten off the roller coaster. He looked up to see who was carrying him and laughed to himself when he saw it was Vlad. He had thought he had heard his voice earlier but everything was seeming kind of distant and fuzzy.

It wasn't that bad in some ways, but for him who was used to having to be so alert all the time it was slightly unnerving. Also how the drug was affecting his body. Danny couldn't exactly feel in a normal sense, the sensation of pain was dulled, and so was just normal touch, but if someone was trying to be gentle that was another matter.

Vlad cradled him to his chest and Danny squirmed a little, wanting to be let down. He didn't like him touching him. It felt weird.

"Danny, quit wiggling!" Jazz said and Danny figured she must have noticed him moving and was trying to make it easier on the older man.

"Can't, don't want..." Danny muttered and shivered. He then stiffened and thought about why he had shivered. Suddenly, violently, he pushed at Vlad's chest, causing him to drop him.

Gasping in pain as he fell on the cement Danny tried to get his bearings. Struggling to stand up his efforts were thwarted even more by people pushing him down and pinning him so he couldn't run.

Immediately Danny panicked.

xXx

Valerie winced as Danny screamed, and had a feeling it wouldn't get any better if they tried to cover his mouth. She was sure it looked like a kidnapping enough as it was. Suddenly Danny stopped screaming and fell limp, his breathing ragged and his eyes still wide. If she had thought the screaming was bad what Danny was rambling was even worse.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Please let me up. Let me go, I won't- please let me up. Don't touch me, get your hands off me. _Please_ let go of me," Danny shuddered, tears forming in the corners of his eyes. "I-I won't run. I won't. Promise, just...just... _please_."

Shocked by the words coming out of the boys mouth everyone let go and Danny sat up, scooting back a bit before curling up, a few tears falling from his eyes.

'What happened to him?' Valerie thought to herself watching as Danny tried to pull himself back together. Sure she knew the one plain fact of rape, but it seemed like there was something else going on. Something much deeper than that.

Jazz and Valerie shared a glance, and then it drew Vlad's attention too. He raised an eyebrow at the girls who exchanged another look between themselves.

"Maybe," was all Jazz said before kneeling down to try and help her brother.

xXx

Danny woke up feeling like shit. He had a massive headache and his stomach felt like it was just waiting for the most opportune moment to crawl up his throat. He groaned and some of the events from the night previous flitted through his head.

He had gone to the party with Valerie, Dark had been there, he decided to skip past that last recollection and went to where some weird kid had given him a pill and Jazz had made him swallow it. After that things got even more confusing and he couldn't exactly remember how he had gotten home. He thought it might have something to do with Vlad though.

Thinking of Vlad made him lift his head a bit, a bad idea, but he looked and saw that he wasn't around anyway. Danny vaguely wondered where he was, but the pounding in his head was still almost as distracting as his desire to hurl.

After a few minutes Danny finally managed to sit up, trying to force the room to stop spinning. Staggering to his feet he almost fell back on the bed, regaining his balance just in time. Now that he was standing he didn't know what he wanted to do. Since it was Saturday his parents would be gone at least half the day shopping or whatever they did when they vanished. Jazz was probably already downstairs and he assumed Vlad was too since he wasn't in the room.

Frowning he realized that Valerie had come over too and they were all probably waiting to accost him in the kitchen. Deciding to delay the inevitable Danny made his way to the bathroom to take a shower and whatnot.

Opening the cabinet for toothpaste he saw a bottle sitting there blaring 'acetaminophen' right in front of his face. Half of Danny's mind immediately screamed 'Relief!' while the other half was still wary of pills considering what had happened the last time he had taken one. Downing two anyway didn't make Danny's stomach any happier, but he got into the shower anyway to wait for them to start kicking in.

Feeling a disturbing amount of déja vu Danny stepped into the shower, turning it on and sighing as the water turned hot. He stood under the spray for a few minutes just enjoying the warmth before he grabbed a washcloth and soap and began meticulously cleaning himself.

"What am I even doing?" Danny muttered to himself as he closed his eyes, leaning back to rinse the shampoo out of his hair.

"I would say you're taking a shower, but that seems so obvious I'm sure you're asking about something else," a voice said from the other side of the curtain and Danny yelped in shock and crouched, covering himself though there was still a shower curtain in the way.

"Vlad you, you-!" Danny exclaimed in shock and anger and a bit of fear. "What the hell are you doing! Get out!"

A thought occurring to him Danny tried to go ghost, relieved when it worked and that his suit appeared so he wasn't naked any more. Ripping back the curtain Danny glared at the other man.

"Daniel, my little badger, what happened? Your sister and little friend won't tell me. I can help you, just tell me." Vlad said and Danny looked at him like he was crazy.

"You _sneak_ into my _bathroom_ while I'm taking a _shower_ to ask me what's wrong?" Danny's eyes glowed briefly with anger, "I don't want to talk to you about it. I don't want to talk about _anyone_ about it, but they won't leave it alone. I can take care of it myself." he growled. In reality he knew that half of what he said wasn't true, but the other man didn't know that.

Vlad sighed and said, "I'm not sure about that."

Or maybe he did.

Danny's fist began to glow and he had to stop himself from punching him right there. He was too high-strung and blasting a hole in their house would not be a way to calm him down, no matter how much satisfaction it would bring.

"Just go." Danny said and Vlad shrugged and walked back out the door without opening it, reminding Danny of what Dark had done.

His calm mood officially shattered Danny resisted the urge to pick up the ceramic cup on the counter and break it into a million pieces, instead just going back into the shower and changing back to human. It seemed that all the soap had vanished when he changed, but he stood there anyway, trying to calm down. He didn't want to go down there and confront Jazz like this.

Sighing in frustration he knocked his head on the side of the shower, closing his eyes for a moment. He then thought about how that hadn't been a very good idea since the pain pills weren't kicking in as fast as Danny would have liked. His anger at Vlad had caused his stomach to tighten as well and as Danny got out of the shower to dry off he realized darkly that he felt worse now than he had before he had gone in.

xXx

When Danny got downstairs he was surprised to see only Jazz was there. Curiosity overcame him and he asked where everyone was. She answered that their parents were out doing something as Danny had suspected, and Vlad had gone out somewhere as well, which considering what had happened earlier he wasn't too surprised about either. He was kind of shocked that Valerie had left without seeing him and asking for an explanation about last night but he shrugged it off. Jazz would probably be relaying whatever happened to everyone anyway and he knew he couldn't make her promise like he had Valerie.

After a minute of silence he sat down at the table across from her. He knew she was going to say something he just wasn't sure what. Danny finally decided he would be the first one to say something.

"Last night...I think I remember you saying that we needed to talk."

Jazz looked at him for a long moment before sighing and running a hand down her face as if she didn't really want to talk but felt like she needed to. She took a deep breath before saying, "First of all, I don't want to accuse you of anything. I want you to tell me anything you think you can tell me. I'm here for you Danny, don't forget that."

"Yeah, ok." Danny said, a lump forming in his stomach. He could tell by her introduction that this was not going to be anything good. Knowing how his luck was going lately it was probably going to be worse than he thought.

He found out how much worse it was a moment later.

"Danny, at the party..." she trailed off, her voice soft, "I heard you. I heard you with...someone, in the bathroom."

Danny paled. He wasn't sure what to say. "I...that was..."

Jazz stared straight at him as he trailed off. He knew that she wasn't going to take any excuses and she told him as much. "Just please tell me what's going on. If you have a boyfriend or something I promise I'll try to understand, but if there's something else going on I want to know." Jazz desperately hoped that Danny _did_ have a boyfriend. She hoped that all his secrecy was because of that and not something more sinister. She knew that it wasn't very likely, though, considering his behavior.

"I...I don't...he's not." Danny stammered, then snapped his mouth shut. Maybe it would be better to let her think that. It would cause less trouble, but he couldn't really imagine telling that lie. It would be too hard. He would probably say something.

Biting her lip anxiously Jazz decided to press a little harder, "I know this is going to sound really _really_ awkward coming from your big sister, but...were you having sex?"

"I wasn't! He was-I mean, I don't-!" Danny burst out and immediately tried to fix his error. Jazz immediately jumped on it though.

"What do you mean by that Danny?" she asked and Danny panicked and unintentional words began to come out of his mouth again.

"He, I mean, I, uh. It wasn't, um, sex, exactly we weren't...I wasn't-" Danny cut himself off again wincing. He was just making things worse for himself. Why couldn't he just shut up? "I'm leaving." he said and quickly stood up.

Jazz immediately jumped up to grab his wrist. He hissed and drew back but she wouldn't let go. When he tried to phase out of her grip she just glared at him and he stopped.

"Tell me." she ground out and decided to try the gamble she was hoping wasn't true. "I know that you were raped. I need to know Danny. Tell me if it happened again."

Danny stopped dead. He turned a sickly white and his silence spoke volumes. Jazz had released his wrist and he took one step back, two.

"Y-you know." he stammered and Jazz frowned, "You're not supposed to know. Valerie wasn't supposed to know, I shouldn't have told her. Sam and Tucker can't know. Don't tell anybody. I don't want you killed. Please."

Jazz was unnerved but pressed forward anyway, "Who was it Danny? Maybe I can help. I want to help you, I don't care if its dangerous!" she exclaimed and Danny shrank back.

"Valerie doesn't even know," he murmured, looking around nervously as if he was afraid whoever they were talking about would pop out any second, and for all 

Jazz knew that could very well happen. Danny took a step toward her although it looked like it pained him.

"Please don't scream or start to ask me a ton of questions." he said and took a breath.

Taking a few more steps closer he made a hand gesture which Jazz recognized from when they were little and he wanted to tell her a secret. Despite of the dark situation it made her a little happy to see a reminder of old times. She took a step closer and bent down obligingly so he could whisper in her ear.

"It's Dan." he whispered before he swallowed and backed up. She saw tears forming in his eyes as he turned and walked away, presumably to his room.

Jazz stood there in silence for awhile. She was confused. 'Dan? Do I know any 'Dan'? But it sounds familiar. Why would it sound familiar if I didn't know anyone who...?'

Her memory was suddenly and painfully jogged when she saw Vlad walk in the door. She let out a gasp of horror and ran to her room, closing and locking the door behind her, sliding down to sit leaning next to it. She was sure Vlad would be confused by her actions, but she didn't care any more. She was too shocked.

_"In the alternate reality the explosion killed you. Killed mom and dad and everyone. I couldn't take it. I went to Vlad, and had him take out my 'emotions' or my ghost half. My ghost half ripped out Vlad's and absorbed it into himself. I'm-I'm not sure what he did to the human half, but..." a breath. "He called himself Dan after that. Dan Phantom, and he was, he_ is _, the most evil, most powerful ghost there is. We just have to hope Clockwork takes care of the thermos."_

Jazz slowly put her trembling hands in front of her mouth as tears slipped from her eyes and she started to sob. "Oh, Danny-! I'm...I'm so sorry!"

xXx

End Chapter Seven


	8. Spiral

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jazz tells Tucker and Sam what's going on, Dark appears at school, and Danny makes a promise.

The rest of Danny's day after he had told Jazz seemed to go by in a haze. He was on autopilot, his mind occupied with the things he had recently done. Why had he told Jazz who it was? He was just making her life harder, and he didn't want to be a burden on anyone. He was the one with ghost powers, he was supposed to be the one helping people, not putting them in more danger from ghosts.

Not like he had seen any ghosts lately other than the one that had been harassing him. He was surprised that not even Clockwork had come to tell him what was going on. If he was even ok. He had to be though, after all he had come to him _after_ the thermos had gone. Suddenly as if his thoughts had summoned the ghost, the coin he had been absently flicking in the air froze.

Looking around he stood from where he had been sitting next to his door. "Clockwork...?" he called softly.

"Yes, Danny?" Clockwork replied as he appeared floating a few feet away from him, making him twitch in surprise.

"Clockwork, you're..." Danny trailed off with a frown. He wasn't sure what he had been expecting the Master of Time to look like. Shocked, maybe. Confused, scared, but there was none of that. Clockwork almost never changed facial expressions, the only time Danny had seen him at least appear frazzled was when he had come to tell him about the Thermos. Suddenly something clicked in Danny's head and he took a step back so he was flat against the door.

"There's no need to be frightened, this is all for your own good. You'll see that," he paused for a second, "This is for the worlds good. As you know I can see the futures and they all looked quite grim, except, perhaps, this one."

"You're saying my future could be worse than this? Worse than _him?_ " Danny said tightly, a note of pain in his voice.

Clockwork just shrugged and said, "I'm sorry, Danny, this is how it has to be."

Danny chuckled humorlessly, "Yeah, of course it does since it was your fault I turned into Dan in the first place." When Clockwork raised an eyebrow Danny continued, "If you hadn't interfered and sent those ghosts from the future after me I never would have caused the accident at the Nasty Burger. The Nasty Sauce never would have been exposed to that heat, and most of all I never would have phased through Mr. Lancers briefcase and gotten the answers stuck to my back. No temptation. No cheating. No one dies."

Clockwork chuckled and shook his head, "You really are quite clever, I should have seen that. Yes, it's all for a purpose. You see, things change for better, and for worse, but always for a bigger purpose. I never had to change the timeline this much before."

"And I never used to get raped by myself either, what's the point?" Danny muttered darkly.

"It will all be revealed in time." Clockwork said before he vanished and the coin fell to the floor.

After a moment Danny sunk to the floor as well. 'That didn't explain anything!' he thought frantically, 'All that did was make me more confused. Does he mean that somehow I deserve to have this happen?'

Danny shook his head, trying to make his thoughts change direction. He couldn't afford to think like that, especially now that it seemed his will power concerning Dark was wearing thin. He had to figure out something, and soon, before whatever Clockwork had been talking about happened.

Clockwork. As his thoughts rounded back to the ghost of time Danny had to wonder. What was his plan? What could he have possibly seen to have him act this way against Danny? It was almost as if Clockwork was the evil ghost in this case. It didn't make any sense. Were they all just pawns now, tools for him to move around as he saw fit?

Danny frowned and worried his lower lip. If that really was the case things were a lot worse, if that was even possible, than he had thought in the first place.

xXx

The next day after lunch the Fentons, excluding Danny who hadn't left his room since Saturday afternoon, drove Vlad to the airport to wait for his plane. Jazz seemed lost in thought and it made Vlad wonder again why she had ran yesterday when she saw him.

It was as if he had triggered some sort of memory and had caused her to be stuck in a state of slight depression. Her parent's didn't seem to notice much other than she wasn't talking and she kept her head down for most of the trip.

He mentally growled at Jack and Maddies apparent blindness to their childrens' dilemmas. It seemed as if they couldn't see anything past themselves. Though Vlad still loved Maddie he was starting to see that she really wasn't the kind of woman he had deluded himself into thinking she was. Maybe they really did belong together, Jack and Maddie, as neither of them seemed good at reading emotions, or really seeing through lies.

Vlad himself had seen what had happened when they saw Danny. First there had been a flash of concern from his mother, and nothing but acknowledgment of his presence from his father. Then, when Danny had said that he was all right she had immediately believed him. Believed him despite all the evidence showing that he was _not_ ok.

Mentally scowling as he bid a _cheerful_ goodbye to his _college friends_ and got onto his jet Vlad's mind was still in a dark place. This trip had been unexpected and what had happened during it even more so. He knew that he would probably be making more visits via his other persona to Amity Park to try and figure out what was happening soon. Something was going on with those children and he needed to find out what, especially with how Danny had been acting.

Leaning back in his seat he tried to sort out as much as he could without knowing details. Danny had something wrong with him, that much had been apparent the first time he had seen the boy, pale and sleep depraved. Vlad was sure Danny didn't know he talked in his sleep or else he never would have allowed him to stay in his room.

He had overheard Danny protesting to someone and muttering other things too soft to hear. Obviously whatever had happened to him was enough to affect his psyche and dreams. It had been enough to cause him to go to a party and seemingly do things he wouldn't otherwise.

Also...when he picked up Danny he had reacted in odd ways. Vlad wasn't sure he wanted to think about either of their reactions, but it was just so odd. Brushing off his own and thinking about Danny's he made a mental note to try and not touch Danny as long as possible. Or unless it seemed relevant to the circumstances.

Shaking his head he decided he would wait to think about it more until he got back to his mansion. Everything always seemed easier to think about in the comfort of his own home.

xXx

The phone rang interrupting Sam from putting on her eyeliner. With a sigh she put down the stick and picked it up. "Yeah?" she said blandly.

" _Sam?_ "

"Yeah, who's this?" Sam asked, a slight frown on her face.

" _It's Jazz._ " a pause and the sound of nervous swallowing, " _Do you- Do you think you can call Tucker and meet me at the park in about half an hour?_ "

Sam's eyebrows crinkled together in confusion. Something was wrong. Jazz sounded as if something had happened, but what could it be? Her mind immediately went to Danny.

Narrowing her eyes she replied, "Yeah, can do. But...one thing I want to ask."

" _Yeah?_ "

"Is...is this about Danny?" Sam blurted out.

She frowned as she heard Jazz's breath catch. " _...it is._ " she said and Sam was worried at the tone her voice had taken on.

Making up her mind Sam nodded though no one could see her. "I'll call Tucker. You said half an hour, but would fifteen be ok?" at Jazz's reluctant yes they said their goodbyes and hung up.

Picking up the phone to call Tucker Sam had a feeling that a lot of things were about to be answered and just hoped they could take what was going to happen.

xXx

Tucker sat on a bench next to Sam, not knowing that only a few days previously Danny had been there with Valerie. Not knowing that a huge confession had taken place in that exact spot. Still blissfully unaware of the horror he would be feeling in a few minutes.

They saw Jazz in the distance and waved at her and she waved back less enthusiastically and wandered in their direction. As she got closer the younger teens exchanged a look. Jazz seemed even more worried than ever. Sam had the impression that she had been been crying.

The two moved apart as Jazz approached so she could sit between them. There was silence for a few minutes before Jazz mumbled, "I almost wonder if we should have gone to your house, Sam, but oh well. Right now that would just be delaying the inevitable."

Sam and Tucker exchanged another worried look Jazz couldn't see and watched with interest and slight confusion as she took out a ghost-detecting device and scanned the area before looking around once more and sighing.

"All right," she said, "So, I...I know what's been going on with Danny."

Sam sat up straighter, "Really? How?" she exclaimed.

"He told me."

xXx

Jazz couldn't believe she was about to break her promise to Danny. Well, actually, she had known all along that she was going to do it, but the reality of telling people was suddenly weighing heavily on her.

She had debated how much she was going to tell his friends, and had almost considered calling Val too, but decided that could wait until later. She figured she didn't have to tell them about the party, and what she had heard happen there, and just say what Danny had said to her earlier.

Wincing and biting at her lower lip Jazz leaned down causing Sam and Tuck to have to lean closer as well. "Yesterday I finally confronted Danny," she started and she saw that Sam was having trouble not saying anything. Jazz continued quickly, "At first he didn't want to say anything but as soon as I said that I 'knew' he was raped..." she trailed off.

"What is it Jazz? Did he say who it was?" Tucker asked, sounding concerned.

She swallowed and licked her lips nervously, "Do you guys remember Dan?" she saw that they drew a blank for a second before their eyes widened.

"Yeah, evil alternate ghost of Danny. I don't know why I didn't remember before you said something though." Sam frowned, "You wouldn't think that you could forget something like that so easily. It hasn't even really been a year."

Jazz agreed and had a suspicion someone or something had been blocking their memories, but that wasn't relevant right now. Tucker was the first one to almost see the implications.

"Why are you talking about him? I mean, isn't he...?"

"No, not any more." Jazz said, hoping that they would realize what she meant so she wouldn't have to say it.

"So now Danny has a psychotic ghost _and..._ " Sam started but trailed off when Jazz shook her head.

There was silence for a few more moments as the younger teens tried to figure out what she meant. Finally Tuckers eyes widened. She didn't mean, she couldn't mean that...

"It's Dan isn't it?"

Sam froze and looked between the two of them helplessly, hoping that Jazz would shout 'Just kidding!' or something, but she knew that that would never happen. 

Swallowing thickly she tried to make sense of it. "You mean to say that Dan somehow got out of the thermos and decided that-that-!" she had to stop and take a deep breath because her voice was getting louder. After a moment she continued in a whisper, "Danny's older, evil self has made up his mind that Danny is the perfect target for...for..."

Jazz saw that she couldn't say it, and couldn't blame her. She was having trouble too. As the three teens sat on the bench, thinking about all that had just come to light Jazz had a thought. If they were having so much trouble just _knowing_ about what was happening with Danny, how was her brother feeling when he had to actually deal with it face to face.

xXx

Monday seemed to come too soon for Danny. Walking through the halls was strange, surreal, almost as if he didn't belong there any more. There also seemed to be something wrong with the atmosphere. Though it was normally kind of dark with the taint of bullying hanging around, today it seemed worse.

As soon as he saw his friends he knew that his day was going to be a bad one.

"Danny, we need to talk. Seriously." Sam said, crossing her arms and staring at him.

'What does she want us to talk about?' Danny thought to himself and said aloud, "Ok, whatever."

Sam didn't look convinced and he had a feeling that he was going to be followed around all day. Tucker was off to the side shifting back and forth nervously as if he wanted to say something now, or warn Danny about something.

Checking the time he saw that they still had about five minutes until class started. He had gotten to school much earlier than last time, and after a second made a decision.

"Hey Tuck, come here, I need to talk to you for a sec." Danny said mock cheerfully and forced himself to grab his friends arm and pull him a distance away.  
As soon as they were out of earshot Danny asked his friend what was going on.

Sighing and fixing his beret Tucker just looked at him and said, "Aren't we the ones who should be asking you that?"

"What do you..." Danny trailed off before his eyes widened and he took a step back. "Jazz."

Tucker watched a variety of emotions flicker across Danny's face and they finally landed on anger and frustration. "Look Danny, you can't do everything yourself. 

Especially against him. You're not putting us in danger, or at least any danger we weren't in already, but if you told us we would at least be prepared if something did happen."

Danny shifted uncomfortably and ran a hand through his hair, "I...all right. I guess...I'm sorry. I should have known that you would say that." he bit his lower lip and looked away, "I'm still not happy. Just say, say that you won't do anything stupid."

'Like you?' were the first words that came to mind for Tucker but he decided it would be better if those were left unsaid.

"All right."

xXx

Sam had been shunning them since Danny dragged Tucker off to talk with him, but that session was abruptly cut short after lunch.

"Where's Lancer?" Somebody asked and someone else shrugged.

"I dunno."

The other person was about to reply when the door opened and everyone fell silent. Two people walked in. One everyone recognized from seeing around school, the other only about five students in the class thought looked vaguely familiar. Of those five students only one recognized him immediately.

As the two walked to stand by the desk all the eyes on the room were on them. The recognizable teacher smoothed her skirt and began to speak.

"Unfortunately Mr. Lancer was feeling unwell and had to go home. Luckily we had this substitute on call. Please welcome..." Danny only caught the first couple sentences as his thoughts drifted off and became more disjointed.

'You have to be kidding me,' Danny thought frantically, desperately trying to keep from staring at Dark who, apparently, had brainwashed _somebody_ into thinking he was a substitute teacher. 'What does he think he's doing? It's not like he can really do anything to me while he's here like this...right?'

The real teacher finally took her leave, and Dark began to speak, "All right, I'll assume that whoever was here before lunch will still be here. You will be treating this as a study hall because your teacher left me no plans. You may talk amongst yourselves, but I had better see you _working._ " He gave them a smile which made Danny shiver and didn't bother to give more details as he went and sat in the desk.

xXx

Students rushed to get some work out. Sam decided to stop ignoring them and got into a group with Danny, Tucker, and Valerie. Danny and Val looked at each other for a second before glancing away, making Sam frown.

They sat there in awkward silence for a few minutes before Sam said, "Do you guys know the sub?"

"What?" Valerie exclaimed, careful to keep her voice soft. "What gave you that idea?"

"Um, maybe the fact that you look so nervous?"

"We met him at a party," Danny mumbled, looking slightly ill.

Sam was about to say something along the lines of ' _Party?_ ' but Tucker interrupted her.

"Hey man, are you ok? You don't look so good."

Danny laughed, "I've been hearing that a lot lately."

"Danny," Valerie started to say but was interrupted by a gasp as Danny put his hands over his mouth.

"Hey, was that...?" Sam asked, looking around as Danny nodded, his eyes wide.

"It's a ghost."

xXx

Dark smirked to himself when he noticed a slight commotion from Danny's group. His younger self was probably trying to figure out what was going on. If he had left a duplicate in the seat and walked over to him or if it actually was another ghost.

The teens question was answered as the Box Ghost flew through the wall, causing mayhem and panic as usual as everyone fled. Resisting to roll his eyes he saw Danny toss a panicked look his way.

With a grin Dark made a shooing motion, his grin growing wider at the confused look. By now it was only Sam Tucker and Danny left in the room. Valerie had probably left to get her gear on and would be back soon. He saw them have what appeared to be a small argument and Danny finally closed his eyes, and Dark was sure he had not been expecting to be able to change when he opened them in ghost form with a look of shock.

Danny glanced over at him once more curiously before flying off to find where the Box Ghost had gone. Sam and Tucker looked to where Dark was sitting calmly at the desk before exchanging a look and following their friend.

Once he was alone Dark let his human guise slip away. Stretching, he grinned again and went to go find his counterpart.

xXx

Blasting a globe of energy from his right hand Danny knocked the Box Ghost nearly senseless. It really had been easy to fight him once he had actually found him again. Now he just needed a thermos, which hopefully Sam or Tucker had that he could use when they got here.

Sighing he stood over the ghost, looking down at him. He remembered what he had looked like in the future, huge, built, and with much more control over his powers. That had probably been because of Dark too. It seemed like his evil older self was not just content with killing and messing with live humans.

Danny made a face and the Box Ghost began to stir. Setting back so he could be ready if he attacked Danny was surprised when he opened his eyes to give him a look of pity. The ghost opened his mouth as if to say something, something besides 'beware', but was interrupted by being sucked into a thermos. Quickly turning around Danny saw Sam and Tucker had finally caught up with him.

"Thanks guys," Danny said, trying to sound enthusiastic about it when he was really sort of upset he hadn't gotten to hear what the Box Ghost wanted to tell him.

A few more people had filtered back into the school now that the ghost was gone. Danny received a few curious looks, after all, nobody had seen the Ghost Boy for almost a week.

Danny was about to go somewhere and change back when he was hit with a sudden force and knocked back into the wall. He winced as he felt a hand on his throat, a familiar hand on his throat. When he opened his eyes he was not surprised, though still afraid, to see Dark grinning at him.

"Hi, Danny boy," he hissed in his ear, "Long time no see."

"You just saw me in class," Danny retorted just as softly. Though the crowd was scared by this new ghost they were still curious to see who had trapped their 'savior' so easily.

Dark laughed, "It's not the same. I haven't seen you like this for awhile."

Suddenly realizing that he was near Dark and his powers hadn't shorted out Danny glared at him, wondering what was going on.

"Don't worry, this won't become regular. It was just so boring seeing our human self all the time." he paused, "Also, if you couldn't go ghost how else could I threaten you effectively with your friends around."

Danny's eyes widened and he looked over Darks shoulder to see his friends standing there in shock. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Valerie on her board flying down and tried to tell her to stop. He wasn't fast enough though and without even looking Dark held a hand out behind himself and blasted her off the board. It managed to catch her before she hit the ground, though it stalled a bit and Sam and Tucker rushed toward her. Still without looking back Dark trapped all three of them in a barrier.

"Oh dear, it seems your friends are captured." Dark said with a grin on his face, "Now all we need is your sister to make it a party."

"What are you going to do, you can't hurt them, I won't let you!" Danny exclaimed causing Dark to laugh.

"You won't let me? What could you possibly do trapped here that would save them over there?"

Danny swallowed and looked around, not quite sure what to do. There was only one thing he could think of to do, but he had a feeling he would be playing right into Dark's hand. Not like he hadn't been doing that already.

A couple moments later Danny took a deep breath. "I...I'll do anything you say if you promise not to hurt them."

Dark raised an eyebrow as if surprised. " _Anything_ I say?" he asked, pushing their bodies together and hissing the words out.

"N-not quite anything I mean I won't turn evil because you tell me to or-or kill someone or, um," Danny rambled, his voice quiet as well. 'Anything' was quite a lot of things and there were still quite a few Danny didn't want to do.

Suddenly hearing a loud noise he saw his parents RV pull up to, or more specifically on, the curb. He hoped that Dark's promise, which hopefully the man intended to at least half way keep, extended to them as well.

Sighing as if disappointed Dark quickly phased their bodies through the wall into the empty room behind it. Danny thought he had heard a shout of outrage from his father and would have smiled if he hadn't just basically given up.

Standing in the room Dark did something with a small device and Danny cried out in pain as he was forced out of his ghostly form. Panting on the floor, Danny had a feeling Dark had made that as painful as possible, Dark knelt down in front of him. Placing a hand on the side of his face Dark leaned in and kissed him roughly, forcing his tongue in his mouth. When he pulled back Danny automatically rubbed a hand over his mouth making him laugh. Since Danny had promised to do anything he didn't have to worry about that any more, not like he seriously had.

With a little finger wave Dark walked out of the room, changing his appearance to human. Yes, today had been a productive day so far and he was sure it was only going to get better.

xXx

End Chapter Eight


	9. Cornered

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everyone is informed of too little, too late.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Character Death

After school Sam and Tucker went to find Jazz before she left. She hadn't been there to see Dan and though she probably heard what had happened she would want to know more details. They found her sitting with Valerie on the schools front steps talking after everyone left.

She had apparently been filling Val in on exactly who they were dealing with and the girl looked slightly unnerved. Though she had been out classed in terms of power before none had taken her down as easily as he had. She still seemed to have the determination needed to help in any way she could though.

Sam and Tucker sat down and there was silence for a few moments, realizing that Val had probably told Jazz what happened.

"So...what can we do?" Tucker asked, jumping into the heart of the matter.

"Try to protect him the best we can," Sam said automatically and Valerie just sent her a flat look.

"Look, Sam," she said plainly, "Doing 'the best we can' is not an option here. It's either all or nothing. As in we do nothing and watch this happen to Danny or we die helping him."

Sam shifted back, startled, and Jazz intervened before it could go too far. "We get weapons. We follow Danny. If Dan shows up we fight him. It's as simple as that."

Tucker wanted to interrupt, say that it wasn't that simple. They were only making plans for themselves not thinking about how the evil ghost would react. After all, instead of killing him and getting rid of what he probably thought of as pests he had just trapped them. Why would he do that?

Valerie saw Tuckers frown and asked what he was thinking. "I'm not quite sure. I mean, we're all looking at Dan as the real bad guy here, and only thinking of any reaction he'll have towards us as deadly violence. He didn't do that though, almost as if he was one of the people being controlled."

"But, who's strong enough to control Dan?" Jazz asked, sounding scared.

"I'm not sure. There's something really strange going on here, and I think we should try and figure that out before we go and talk to Danny." Tucker said and Valerie nodded.

Jazz bit her lower lip, thinking, "How about we meet somewhere later, I mean, I really want to go home and check on Danny first."

The others agreed, after all she was his big sister. They decided to meet at the park a little later that afternoon, if nothing came up.

Jazz waved halfheartedly at the younger teens as she drove off, a frown on her face. She actually could think of one ghost that may be more powerful, or at least able to intimidate Dan, but no. That couldn't be possible.

What would Clockwork have to gain from all this anyway?

xXx

Clockwork stood in his tower looking into the portals all around him. The one he was focusing on the most right now still seemed clear, and a good fate, at least for most of the people involved.

He shook off a wave of slight guilt, a ghost who manipulated time and life didn't have a place for such feelings, and waved a hand in front of a mirror watching the scene inside of it. A small, dark-haired girl ran across her lawn, stopping to stare at a boy who staggered down the street for a second before running inside.

Such a profound difference she would make in the future with only the small sacrifice of a few people.

Clockwork waved his hand in front of him again, causing all the portals to close and he froze the mirror in front of him where it was. With a nod he waved his staff, preparing to go see Dan.

Time was running short and he had to make sure the ghost knew that his little escapade would only last for a few more days.

xXx

Vlad sat in his office in his mansion. He had come to discover some unsettling things in the past few hours. A new ghost had been sighted in Amity Park and it had seemed to know Danny. He supposed that wasn't that unusual with the boys fame as a Halfa, but this encounter had been different.

He had attacked the boy physically instead of an energy blast, a very odd thing for a ghost to do, and then he had actually stopped and talked to him.

Vlad frowned. When was the last time he had heard of a ghost who actually just talked instead of spouting insults or claiming their superiority while wasting ecto-blasts? Leaning on his elbows Vlad tried to piece together what was happening.

While he had been visiting he had noticed Danny and his friends odd behavior. He hadn't been sure what to connect it to at the time, but with the appearance of this ghost, though it was new, Vlad had a feeling that he was a large part of it.

Vlad was worried. Very worried.

He needed to go see Danny, and soon. They needed to talk about a lot of things, and sort some others out. Vlad was still frustratingly occupied with what had happened the night he had to carry Danny home. The boy had felt nice in his arms, and when he had struggled away and Vlad had been forced to drop him the older man had been very...disappointed.

Making a sound of frustration Vlad slammed a palm to his forehead. He did not need to be thinking like that. Danny was still underage, and Vlad was the same age as his father. Vlad shuddered at the thought, and more at the fact that even those reasoning's hadn't deterred him that much.

Sighing to himself Vlad leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes, deciding he would go see Danny later that night. Until then, though, he still had a lot to think about.

xXx

Danny sat listlessly in his room doing nothing. He was sure he had a bunch of stuff to do, like homework, but somehow that seemed almost pointless. After all, if you had just promised your evil older self you would do anything would you still worry about grades?

Danny sighed as that last thought passed and tried to work himself out of his depression. Just sitting around moping and being afraid all the time wasn't going to do anything. Thinking again he realized that Dark probably wouldn't keep his promise about not hurting his friends, so why should Danny keep his promise to do anything?

He shook his head immediately though. How could he know Dark _wasn't_ going to keep it. If Danny acted in a way to contradict what he said, who was to know whether or not Dark would have done the same thing.

Making a sound of frustration Danny sat on his bed and leaned forward, putting his face in his hands. He didn't know what to do. He had almost given up and that disgusted him. The teen was worried about his friends now that they knew and it was hindering him from being able to think properly.

A knock on his door startled him and he found himself standing before he even knew what he was doing. Blowing out a calming breath he called "Come in" expecting it to be Jazz or one of his parents come to interrogate him about what had happened at school.

He was completely confused and shocked when Vlad walked through the door instead. He got over it quickly though, and remembered the last time the man had come to talk to him.

"Deciding to come talk to me while I actually have clothes on? How shocking." Danny quipped, still slightly annoyed.

Vlad sighed and shrugged. "I apologize for my behavior earlier."

Danny sighed and muttered 'whatever' before looking at him and raising an eyebrow. "Why are you here anyway? I thought you went home."

"I did, but I came to talk with you about what has been happening recently. I heard about the ghost attack," at that Vlad noticed Danny flinch, "and I wanted to see that you were all right."

"Yeah, I'm fine." Danny said automatically and Vlad of course didn't believe him.

Walking over and pulling up Danny's computer chair Vlad sat across from the young teen. "No, you are not fine. You are pale and sleep depraved. When you do sleep it's restless and you have all sorts of nightmares. You seem as if someone is about to jump out and attack you at any second. What's wrong?"

As Vlad had been talking Danny's eyes had grown wider and wider. Slightly panicked he wondered if it was that obvious to everyone, and if it was what he could do to hide it better. That thought was thrown out as he looked at Vlad though. He wasn't sure if there was anything that could hide it from the older Halfa and his Maddie and Danny senses.

Danny chuckled softly at that. It was as if Vlad had some sort of radar that told him if something was going on with him or his mother, though lately it had been leaning more toward him.

Vlad raised an eyebrow, wondering what Danny was thinking about. He briefly thought to try and prompt the boy into speaking, but knew that it would only serve to put him more in his shell.

"I'm being...harassed, by a ghost. I'm fine. He won't do anything to anyone besides me. I can handle it, there's no need for anyone to get involved." Danny said suddenly and it took Vlad a moment to realize he was answering his question.

When it did sink in the older man was shocked. He wasn't sure what to say. His first thoughts were about trying to tell Danny that he would take care of it for him. Then he almost said that he would protect Danny so he wouldn't have to worry about it. All his thoughts were along that line after that. Why should a fifteen year old boy have to deal with something like this?

Not being able to find anything better to say, at least that he should say, Vlad finally spoke. "Danny, I want you to know that if there's anything I can do to help you I won't hesitate to do so. I know we haven't always been on the best of terms, but I still want to be able to help you if I can."

Danny bit his lip and looked away. There was that 'anything' promise again. He was sure that no one thinking straight would actually say that; he certainly hadn't been.

"Ok," Danny said softly and sighed, still not looking at Vlad.

"Daniel," Vlad said, reaching out and taking Dannys chin so he would look at him, and somehow Danny managed not to flinch as he looked him in the eyes, "I'm serious right now. Please tell me what I can do."

"There's nothing you can do," Danny said softly, "The only thing you could do is go back to your mansion and stay there so I don't have to worry about you too."

Vlad sighed, still not releasing his hold, "I know you think you have my best intentions in mind, but I can take care of myself. I have been doing this for quite some time, you know." he paused for a second, "You should not be the one worrying about things, you're still only a child. If I think I should have someone worrying about me, I will worry about myself." he said bluntly and Danny just stared at him in shock.

"But you have no idea-"

"No I do not, because you won't tell me, but I'm sure I can take care of myself." Vlad said, cutting him off with finality.

There was silence for a few minutes while Danny thought it over. Vlad loosened his grip on Danny's chin and the boy glanced to the side. Vlad did have a point, he tried to convince himself, and he should be all right as long as he didn't get attention drawn to him. For awhile at least.

Looking back at the older man he swallowed before whispering, "Thank you. I just...don't want anyone else to get hurt."

In that instant, that moment of vulnerability and acceptance of whatever Vlad did that the older mans restraint broke. He found himself propelled forward those few inches until his lips lightly touched the young teens.

Danny was shocked. Frozen in place and confused, very confused. Why would Vlad kiss him? And why was it not as horrible as it should be? After a moment Vlad pulled back and started to apologize, but Danny surprised them both by leaning forward and kissing him again. He thought it was strange that it felt almost familiar, but at the same time completely different than anything he had felt before. Their mouths came together again and Danny found his lips parting for the older mans tongue.

For those few moments Danny felt safe. It seemed like there was at least one person who wasn't forcing him to do anything. As if he didn't have any weird powers. As if no one was after him. As if Dark...

Before that thought could finish Danny pulled back and launched himself to the other side of his bed, holding onto the headboard so he didn't fall off. He put his hand to his mouth for a moment, staring at the startled man in front of him. He had no idea.

"I shouldn't have...I shouldn't..." Danny startled to say, his voice wavering as he looked around.

"What's wrong Danny?" Vlad asked, concerned. It had seemed as if Danny hadn't minded what they were doing, but now something else was on his mind.

"I shouldn't have done that. He's going to find out, and-" Danny was interrupted by the sound of the front door slamming and Jazz running up the stairs calling his name. "You need to go. Go back to your mansion, hide in your lab or something. You can't-"

Vlad got up and grabbed Danny's arm making the teen attempt to jerk away from the grip. "I told you that I would be fine."

"No! You won't! Just go!" Danny hissed and yanked his arm back. Jazz called his name again and he knew any second she would be bursting through his door.

Sighing, Vlad stared at Danny for a second letting him know that he wanted to talk to him later. Finally he turned, transforming into his ghost form and left the room going outside just as Jazz walked in.

xXx

Dark was pissed. Clockwork had come to him earlier telling him their time was almost up. He had then gone to Danny's to see what the boy was doing and maybe mess with him more. It was then that he found his property otherwise occupied with Vlad.

It had taken all that he had left of his willpower to not attack the older ghost then. Clockwork had warned him that he was going back in that damned thermos if he attacked him without being 'physically provoked.' Dark growled, wondering what he could do.

He was certain there were some loopholes, he just had to think a bit. Maybe it really was obvious and he just hadn't seen it before because he wasn't sure how long he had. Sitting in the park on a bench he had claimed as his own he assumed his human form, leaning forward with his chin in his hand thinking.

If only there was a way to provoke him into attacking him first without seeming too obvious. Clockwork would know, regardless, and maybe the ghost was actually planning on Dark doing something. The sadist frowned, wondering what Clockwork was really up to. That ghost had always been an enigma.

"I don't know if I want to see it though." Dark's musings were interrupted by a young couple walking past him. Something about that reminded him of something.

"Come on, it's just a movie."

"Yeah, but it's rated 'R', and I'm not sure."

"Do you even know the definition of an 'R' movie? They can say 'fuck' twice and it automatically moves from pg-13 to 'R', and seriously. If you think the movie sounds interesting, why care about the rating?"

The couple continued walking making Dark miss the rest of the conversation. It didn't matter anyway. He already knew what he was going to do. An evil grin worked its way across his face.

He had his plan now, but he still wanted this all to end in Amity Park. For a few moments he contemplated how to get Vlad back here, but then he saw him walking across the park.

"Speak of the devil," Dark muttered with a smile, catching Vlad's attention for a moment before the seemingly distracted man continued walking. Dark was sure that that would be enough for Vlad to remember this place.

Things all seemed to be falling in place for the evil ghost quite nicely now, all he needed was a nice trip to Wisconsin.

xXx

"Nice of you to knock." Danny said sarcastically and Jazz sighed at him.

"Well sorry for wanting to come see if you were ok. Val told me about the ghost attack at school." she noticed Danny twitch and continued cautiously, "That was Dan wasn't it?"

"Dan..." Danny said, rolling the name around in his mouth. It sounded so foreign, he was so used to him being referred to as Dark that his 'real' name sounded strange. He sighed, "Yeah, it was."

"So he..." Jazz trailed off, wincing as she realized that she could be being really insensitive.

Danny looked up at her flatly, "He what? Stalked me? Mentally tortured me? Raped me? Yeah, he did, and he'll do it again." he said bitterly leaving Jazz shocked.

She started to try to speak several times before she just let out a sound of frustration. "How can you say that? You're barely fifteen!"

The mention of his age, something usually only mentioned lightly and around his birthday set him back a bit. Trying to still act nonchalant he retorted, "So, what does that have to do with anything?"

"Danny, you know what I mean. You shouldn't have to worry about this kind of stuff," Jazz said, unknowingly echoing what Vlad had said earlier, "You should be worrying about normal teen stuff, like school and things!"

"I stopped worrying about 'normal' things when I turned into a Halfa." Danny said and sighed, running a hand through his hair. "I don't want to talk about this. I know you want to talk about this, and my friends probably do too, but I..." he trailed off with a wavering sigh.

Jazz shifted her weight back and forth for a second before she sighed as well, "All right. I guess I can leave it for a bit. How about you come hang out with us anyway? Everyone thinks that I'm going to be bringing you to talk about what we can do about Dan, but I guess I'll try to make them back off."

Danny smiled at her as he stood up. "You can be a pain sometimes, but really I don't mind having you as a big sister."

xXx

The next day Dark decided to make his trip to Wisconsin. He could have done it later that night after he had seen Vlad in the park, but he decided he wanted to have some fun with Danny between the time Vlad saw the tape and he came to 'hurt' him. Dark chuckled, leaning back in Vlads desk chair. The mansion had really been quite easy to break into, all things considered. It was nothing compared to the mans security in the future. Then again Dark had to remind himself that this one still had his ghost powers. Not like it mattered.

The look on Vlads face was quite amusing to the sadist when he walked into his office and found someone already occupying his chair. He was too shocked to attack him there, which in some ways was disappointing, but others was just as Dark had been planning. There was silence while Vlad just stared at the other man and Dark smiled back at him.

Finally breaking out into a chuckle Dark said, "Nice to meet you again, Masters."

"Do I know you?" Vlad said rudely, shaken by the person in front of him. For some reason he gave him a very bad feeling. After a moment he recognized him from the park yesterday, where he had brushed him off. "What do you want?"

"Oh, I just came to deliver this," Dark said, holding up a small tape that looked as if it had come from an old video camera. "I found it amusing and thought that I would share it with you." he set it down on the desk where Vlad eyed it warily.

"What's on it?"

"Don't worry, you'll find out soon enough." Dark chuckled, "I would watch it with you, but I have something I need to go do." he chuckled again, as if he had some sort of inside joke.

Vlad found himself shivering. There was definitely something wrong with this man. Also, how had he gotten into the mansion? While he was distracted the man stood and began walking out. As soon as he walked past him Vlad spun around, finally getting some sense back.

"Who are you?" he finally asked and Dark stopped for a second before turning back, a slightly insane grin on his face.

"Dark Phantom." he said and turned away before mumbling the rest of the sentence so Vlad wouldn't hear, "Don't bother to remember it. You won't have to remember anything soon."

xXx

Danny's day had been going so well he supposed he shouldn't have been surprised when it began going downhill. After hanging out with his friends and sister the day before he had been in a better mood than he had been for a long time. When he had gone to school earlier he didn't get called on for anything, and Dash had been avoiding him lately so there was no problem from him.

Jazz had something to do after school and she wouldn't be home for a couple hours. Danny's parents were gone again, probably hunting ghosts, and he had no idea when they would be back. He should have realized that with the house empty it was the perfect time for a ghost to come see him.

"Hello Danny."

Danny jumped about a foot in the air, spinning around to stare at Clockwork floating next to the door in his room. He put a hand to his chest, feeling his heart racing against his ribcage. "C-Clockwork." he stuttered, "Why are you here?"

"I just came to warn you. There is not much time left, and you need to be prepared."

"Not much time...what are you talking about?" Danny said, growing more nervous by the second.

"You will find out." Clockwork said and Danny bristled, "I must go now, I have things to attend to."

"Wait!" Danny called before Clockwork could go, "What are you talking about? What should I be prepared for? What else could go wrong that I need another vague warning! Just tell me what's going on or don't tell me anything at all!" Danny yelled, frustrated.

Clockwork just tsk'd and shook his head. "These things must happen. There is a greater reason for everything." he said before disappearing.

A second after he disappeared Danny finally succumbed and let out a scream of frustration. Why was this happening to him? What higher entity had he pissed off to make his life this way? He beat his head softly against the wall a few times before sighing and closing his eyes, still leaning on the wall.

He needed to calm down. Nothing good ever came out of being angry, it just gave him headaches. Just as he was starting to mellow out his ghost sense went off. 

'Not now, please not now,' Danny mentally pleaded, sliding down while still facing the wall, not wanting to turn around and see who it was. Who he knew it must be.

"What a cold welcome," Dark said and Danny finally looked over his shoulder to see him sitting in his computer chair.

"Why would I welcome someone I don't want to see?" Danny asked without thinking, immediately covering his mouth with his hands. When the expected reaction didn't come he looked over at him warily.

He was still there, sitting calmly next to Dannys bed. "Come here," he said and motioned toward the bed.

Danny slowly got up and made his way to the bed, glancing at Dark curiously and cautiously. Sitting down gingerly he winced when his chin was grabbed. He felt like this was very familiar and it was giving him a bad feeling.

"Kiss me." Dark said calmly and Danny's eyes widened.

"W-what?" Danny stuttered. This was not good, the way Dark was acting it was as if he knew about...

"You heard me," Dark said, his voice still deceptively calm, "I told you to kiss me."

Danny swallowed, remembering his promise, and leaned forward barely brushing their lips together before moving back. Dark raised an eyebrow and Danny's heart sank when a look he didn't recognize crossed the other mans face.

"That wasn't very passionate. Maybe this will instill more enthusiasm." Dark said quietly and Danny thought his heart would stop in horror when Dark changed his form to duplicate Vlad.

"No!" Danny found himself gasping before he could realize what he was doing. "I mean-what do you mean?" he tried to cover his slip badly as Dark changed back to himself. 

"Don't try to lie to me. I know, Danny, I _saw you._ " Dark said and Danny found himself shrinking back in fear.

He couldn't speak. He could only think about how horrible this was, and how he shouldn't have let Vlad do that. How he shouldn't have done that to Vlad. Without him noticing he started to hyperventilate. Somewhere he heard Dark chuckle darkly before his head was violently turned to the side by the force of a slap.

As Danny scooted back and slightly curled himself up, unconsciously holding where he had been hit, Dark was moving to lean over him. Looking down into Danny's wide eyes he smiled.

"I thought I had made it clear that I didn't want you touching other people. I suppose I'll just have to teach you another lesson." Dark sighed, moving completely on top of the teen and putting a hand up his shirt.

"No! I, Jazz will be home soon, and you- I-" Danny started to protest, but when he saw the look on Darks face he knew it was futile. The older man was serious and nothing Danny did was going to get him out of this.

"Protesting again," Dark growled, "Another bad habit I need to get you out of."

Danny could tell that his struggling, no matter how small it was, was working even more against him to make Dark lose his temper. At one end that was something the teen was deathly afraid of. He had no idea what Dark could do when he was pissed off, and yet...that was part of how on the other end of the spectrum he wanted to anger the other man. Maybe if he got him mad enough he would kill him, or give him brain damage, or something so he wouldn't be aware of what was going on. Danny found himself going into those morbid thoughts more often now, and as Dark roughly unbelted and removed Dannys pants that was almost what he was wishing for.

"There's nothing I can do," Danny whispered, helpless horror in his barely audible voice.

"You're right. There is nothing," Dark hissed back before roughly tugging down his own pants.

"Help me...Dark."

xXx

Jazz got home and immediately knew something was wrong. It was almost like the echo of a scream and it made her automatically worry for her younger brother. 

Dropping her things she ran upstairs to Danny's room. She hesitated in front of his door for a second before she heard something heavy fall, followed by the clatter of a few smaller things.

Throwing open the door she gasped and took a step back. She hesitated for another second before she ran over to Danny who was on the floor struggling to get up.

"Danny what-" She started to say but cut herself off. It was obvious what had happened. "Nevermind. Uh..." she trailed off, trying not to stare at him too badly.

Danny shifted again, getting on his hands and knees as Jazz knelt by him, her hands out as if to try and help him but didn't know what to do. He hissed in pain as he tried to use the bed as leverage to stand up and Jazz immediately tried to stop him.

"I'm fine!" he bit out and reached onto his bed to grab his boxers. Somehow he managed to get them on while at least half way covering himself with the shirt he still had on. He hoped they covered the blood too.

"No Danny! You are not fine! I know you don't want to go to a hospital, but you should at least lay down!" Jazz said, her voice slowly rising in hysteria. How could he have done that to her little brother? Why had he done it? Why couldn't she stop him?

"I can't! I don't have time!" Danny yelled at her, and a burst of adrenaline helped him stand with only a couple staggers.

He stood there breathing slowly for a moment, his eyes closed and his face in a grimace. Jazz stood up as well and went to him.

"Why can't you, Danny? What do you mean you don't-" Jazz started to ask but was interrupted.

"I need to go!" Danny exclaimed, his eyes snapping open, "I need, I-! He's going to-!"

Jazz watched in confusion and horror as Danny wiped at his eyes, a couple tears going down his cheeks. Swallowing the urge to ask what was really going on Jazz said, "All right. This is against my better judgment and I really wish you would explain but...Where do you need to go?"

He looked up at her with wide blue eyes, thankful but confused. "The park. I need to go to the park."

"All right, let's go." Jazz said, and put a hand in her pocket and when it came out there was a phone. "I am calling the others. No matter what you say." she added as Danny started to protest and he just blew out a breath instead.

"All right, but please don't take long. I have to, this is all my fault," he said, his hands raising to his face and he bit his lip.

Again Jazz almost said something but instead just opened her phone and started helping Danny down the stairs. She would just have to find out later.

xXx

Dark arrived at the park shortly after Vlad. He took a few moments to observe the other man. It was obvious that he was furious and doing everything he could to try and not blow something up. Dark chuckled silently to himself. Just as he had planned.

Or was it just as Clockwork had planned?

Dark shook his head, reminding himself it was a futile exercise to think about the Time ghost. If there was something he wanted to do no one would know about it until it was too late, and then they probably wouldn't know who had caused their plan to go awry.

Deciding that he would start, Danny would probably be here in a few minutes after he managed to be able to move. Dark smirked to himself remembering. Yes, it might take Danny a bit.

Floating down so he was a few yards away from Vlad Dark became visible. The other man visibly tensed, but surprisingly didn't go ghost. They stood there in silence for a few moments just staring at each other and assessing.

"I'm going to kill you." Vlad finally said and it surprised Dark into laughter.

"You kill me? _You_ kill _me?_ " He asked between chuckles. "Please, you're being so melodramatic. And completely unrealistic."

Vlad just managed to get out of the way as Dark shot an ectoblast at him completely without warning. While still moving Vlad changed into his ghost form and sent a duplicate behind Dark who dispatched it without even looking.

Their fight went that way for a couple minutes, Dark actually getting a shot on one of Vlads arms, and Vlad was beginning to think that the other man was prolonging it on purpose. It was as if he was waiting for something to happen. He wasn't sure what but Vlad was sure he wasn't going to like it. He thought of escaping for a moment but brushed it off.

This was the man who had hurt his Danny. The boy he wanted as his own son, and as of recently, maybe something more.

Suddenly as if his thoughts had summoned him Vlad saw Jazz's car screech to a halt and the girl jump out and run around her car to try and help Danny get out, though Danny just tried to brush her off.

He didn't even notice Dark had stopped attacking him as he stared at the boy coming closer. Danny was still just wearing a long shirt and boxers. He looked ragged, as if something had just happened to him and Vlad found his gaze turning to Dark for a moment to catch the satisfied smirk on his face. He felt his rage growing, but his attention was drawn back to the teens when he heard shouting and saw Danny's little posse run up.

xXx

The first thing Valerie did when she saw Danny was just stare. She then looked between Danny and the still smugly smirking Dark a couple times. Then she took out her gun and shot at him. When it didn't hit him she shot again. And again.

Dark began walking toward them and that got Vlad moving too, to try and get between them. Jazz and Tucker had finally gotten Val to stop shooting and now she was glaring at him with loathing.

"My my, what a party we have here. If only the parents had been able to attend." Dark sighed with mock regret.

"What do you want?" Jazz asked, worried that Danny hadn't done anything other than stare at his older self since they had gotten there.

"That, dear Jazz, is a very good question." Dark said, stopping a couple yards from where they were standing. Vlad was between him and the teens though he was off to the side a bit. "I want quite a few things. Your brother, for instance. Or maybe the death of everyone on the planet, and one right now in particular." he said, turning to look at Vlad.

"Vlad? But why?" Sam asked, finally finding her voice. She had been struck silent at seeing the state Danny was in.

Dark snorted and opened his mouth to speak but Danny pushed forward and interrupted him.

"Dark, it wasn't his fault. Please just let him go."

"Dark?" Sam asked curiously, but was ignored.

"Then whose fault was it Danny? Yours? I suppose it was a bit, but of course, I think the adult should be the one responsible in situations like this. After all, taking advantage of a poor, innocent teenager." he tsk'd, "What kind of monster could do that?"

"You." Vlad said, drawing attention back to himself. "You're the monster."

Danny tried to protest and forced his way out of his friends grasps, starting forward a few feet. Vlad stepped in front of him not letting him go any farther.

"What are you doing? If I could just...I could-!" Danny tried to get Vlad to move out of the way, but the older man would have nothing of it.

"No, Daniel. I will not move, I'm here to protect you."

Danny tried to say something more, but he stopped and his eyes widened as he saw a green glow coming from Dark. He tried to warn Vlad, get him out of the way, but it was too late.

Somewhere that seemed very far away Sam screamed as Danny watched Vlad fall to the ground. He knew he should be looking at Dark, making sure he wasn't going to do anything more, but he couldn't. All he could think was that this was impossible. This couldn't be happening.

"No." he said, falling to his knees and grabbing Vlad. Turning him so his face was up he tried not to notice the man had turned back human. Tried not to notice the blood pooling under his body. Tried not to notice the hole in his chest.

"That was wonderfully touching. A bit too touching." Dark said by way of explanation, but no one was listening any more.

Danny was in shock, completely unaware of what was going on around him. The only thing he could think was that it was all his fault. If he hadn't done anything, if he hadn't fought back, if he hadn't talked to anyone, to Vlad, none of this would be happening.

xXx

Clockwork watched from a distance as Dark killed Vlad. He could have stopped him, it was not completely necessary, but changing the future twice in less than a year seemed to be almost pushing a limit. He saw Danny fall, sitting frozen as Vlad's blood pooled around them.

He had to step in soon, it was time. He knew that Dark would not be pleased about it, but what was that man ever pleased about? Sighing as he saw Dannys parents appear out of nowhere as they always did he slipped through his portal, stopping time as he stood next to Dark.

Clockwork had temporarily given Dark a time pendent so he wasn't effected by the Time Outs, and the look on his face was almost comical, realizing his time was over. He sighed only a second later and shook his head.

"I suppose I shouldn't complain, after all you did allow me to do all this." Dark waved his hands in a motion as if he was showing off.

Clockwork thought about Darks wording for a moment. It sounded as if he had almost ordered the sociopath to do everything, and actually in a way he had. Mentally shrugging he tucked that bit of thought into a place in his mind he reserved for slight regret.

"It's time to go." he said, as if nothing was wrong around them. "Get Danny and I will be waiting in the portal." With that he stepped back and re-started time.

He heard the screams of Danny's name, Dark's cocky banter and insults. The way he blatantly showed everyone that there was no hope, that he had no sense of remorse. Danny had fainted from shock and Dark picked him up to carry away. Clockwork watched, resigned and positive that he was right in what he was doing. Dark walked through the portal, leaving three devastated teenagers and a pair of shocked and confused parents behind.

xXx

Danny drifted back into consciousness slowly. He wasn't exactly sure what had happened. He frowned, blinking a couple times as he realized he was on a bed. His head throbbed and he gasped and put a hand up to his forehead until it subsided.

Looking around again he swallowed, thinking the room looked sickeningly familiar. Glancing up he saw a canopy of blood red satin and his eyes widened in remembrance and recognition. This was where it had started, where he had first found out Dark was out again.

His mind raced trying to figure out what had happened before he had apparently passed out. He could remember shouting, and his friends, and Vlad...

"Oh god, Vlad!" Danny gasped, a hand rushing to cover his mouth. He hadn't meant to, if only Vlad had listened to him. If he had had some self control it would be fine.

He jumped as a door he hadn't seen slammed open and Dark strode in. "Well well, it seems as if you have woken up."

"Where am I?" Danny asked, still too lost in his emotions to do much.

Dark chuckled, "I would think you already knew."

"I know this is the room where..." Danny trailed off and shook his head before asking again, "Where are we?"

"The Ghost Zone. In my tower." Clockwork said, suddenly appearing.

Dannys eyes widened as he saw the Ghost of Time standing next to his future self, "You! I knew you were-! Why are you helping him?" Danny exclaimed.

"I am not helping him." Clockwork said in his usual calm manner, "I suppose you could either say I am helping Time or helping the World. I told you, Danny, this has to happen."

Biting back a childish retort Danny sat silently waiting for more explanation.

"Well Clockwork, now that it seems our 'deal' is over, what are you going to do with us?" Dark asked. He wasn't nervous about anything that could happen, he was too stubborn to stay dead and even if he got put back in that damned thermos he was sure he could fight his way out eventually. Lately he had been trying to figure out the other ghosts plan, but he had come up blank as well.

"This area is part of my Tower, and yet not. I have secluded it so Time acts differently. You will have this bedroom, plus two other spare rooms and a living room area." Clockwork began to explain, "A bathroom with a shower is down the hall as well. There is no need for you to eat due to time manipulation, but if you desired a kitchen could be put in."

There was silence while Danny tried to process everything. "So...it sounds like you're saying I'm just stuck here. With him. Forever?" His voice wavered a little at the end and Dark snorted softly looking away.

Clockwork shrugged, turning and floating out of the room his voice drifted in with the customary, "Time will tell."

After Clockwork left Dark moved further into the room, closer to where Danny was still immobile on the bed.

"If it makes you feel better I didn't know this was going to happen either." Dark said, causing Danny to look at him oddly. Since when did Dark know anything of sympathy.

"What do you care?" Danny muttered under his breath, not really realizing he said it until he looked up to see Dark frowning at him.

"And here I was, trying to be at least a little kind," Dark lamented, shaking his head. "Ah well, I should have known. After all the last time I tried to rekindle my human emotions it sent you running right to someone else's arms. Or should I say their tongue?" He slowly turned so he was facing Danny, "Where did I go wrong to turn my poor little boy into a whore?"

Danny shuddered as Dark slowly slid a hand up his leg, "I'm sorry I shouldn't have...shouldn't have let him touch me." he murmured, hating himself even as the words left his mouth.

"It's ok, Daniel," Dark purred, "You have time to make mistakes, time for me to forgive you or punish you." Danny's breath quickened in nervousness and unease as Dark gently lifted his shirt.

"I, uh, you seem different," Danny managed to say, scared by the huge personality shift Dark had just taken.

"Don't worry, I'm still here," Dark said and Danny mentally winced, "I just thought, we have forever now. I have forever. Do you know how many tricks I could teach a dog if I spent every moment with it from now to eternity?"

Dannys mouth went dry, not even wanting to think about what Dark was implying, hoping that what what Clockwork had said meant that he wouldn't be stuck here.

"Speechless, Danny?" Dark hissed against Dannys lips, pushing the boy down to the mattress. "Don't worry, we can talk later. We do have more than a little time to talk after all."

"Welcome to forever."

xXx

End Chapter Nine


	10. Dark

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings: Sex, Character Death
> 
> Well, this is the end. Hopefully you've enjoyed it and thank you for reading.

_Have you ever been so obsessed with getting free of something that it just pulled you in deeper? Wanting out so badly, yet you can't leave. A person. A place. _A possession. Realizing you want it so badly, it hurts you to keep it, to keep going to it but you can't stop.__

_Your obsession controls you. You say you don't want to do that, you can't do that though you're walking toward what you know you should be desperately running away from._

_Dark._

_I hate him. I hate him so much. If I had the chance I would kill him in a heartbeat._

_Obsession._

_I need him. I need him so much. I can never lose him, no matter how far away I get._

_He'll always be with me._

xXx

Danny opened his eyes slowly, blinking the sleep out of them. He didn't feel any pressure beside him but turned over anyway to confirm that Dark was already up. With a sigh Danny turned onto his back, not wanting to get up yet, to go through this little play.

How long had he been here? How long had they been doing this? There was no way to tell time, no clocks, no sun, not even their sleep patterns to see how many weeks, months, years he had been trapped in this hole.

Sometimes he wondered if Clockwork stopped time for them, he really couldn't imagine that he hadn't done that. Though if that's what he was doing Danny also had to wonder if he was just keeping them for a certain amount of time before letting them go. Assuming both of them went, of course.

Danny shook his head as he sat up in bed and brushed his hair back. No one would ever be able to understand Clockwork, but really there was no reason in any possible future that it would be good to let his homicidal sadistic self out in the world again.

Sighing as his thoughts ran in a circle he wondered where Dark was. He usually got up before Danny but was back soon enough after he woke up. Danny supposed he could have decided to do something else today, but he had a feeling that wasn't true. They had been doing things so long like this it wouldn't make sense to change. Though he told himself that, something about how today felt was different than normal and it made him nervous.

He almost chuckled at that. Why would doing something different than usual make him nervous? It wasn't as if Dark hadn't already done everything imaginable to him, and other than just blatant bodily harm Danny figured he shouldn't have anything to worry about. All the damage that could be done was done and nothing could change that. Whatever difference _might_ happen wouldn't matter at all.

Pulling on a pair of boxers and a t-shirt Dark had left for him, apparently he was feeling nostalgic, Danny left the room. He found Dark on the couch watching a movie. Clockwork had apparently decided that it really was too boring to just have the two of them there with little else, so an entertainment system had appeared one day. Danny had thought about checking the movies for a date of release, but it was always blurred out somehow.

He stopped in the entrance way, just watching Dark for a moment. Neither of them had aged or changed physically since they got there, except when Dark decided to look human which he apparently did today, but still they both seemed different. Dark had relaxed a little since he had all the time he could want, and maybe more, with Danny, and what little hope Danny had had left abandoned him and it showed.

Sure hope would make an appearance once and awhile, but now that was unusual. He tried to keep it at bay most of the time because whenever Dark talked to him it would just be crushed again and again.

Dark turned his head, noticing he was there and raised an eyebrow at him before turning back to the movie. Sighing quietly Danny walked over and sat down next to him. Without looking over Dark put out an arm, wrapping it around Dannys shoulder before pulling them down to the couch, back to chest with Darks arm around Dannys waist

They lay like that for awhile, neither of them moving or talking. It wasn't a comfortable silence, there was no such thing with the two of them, but it wasn't uncomfortable either.

Finally Danny moved, tilting his head back so he could look at Darks face and try to figure out what he was thinking. Dark looked down at him and raised an eyebrow to which Danny just half shrugged and said, "Is this all you're doing?"

Dark shrugged, "What else might I do?"

Danny felt a sudden rush of anxiety at the nonchalant tone. Had Dark finally gotten bored of him? He'd had thoughts like this before, what if Dark did get bored of him? Would he kill him? No, Clockwork wouldn't allow that. Then would he just ignore him, or...

Danny's thoughts trailed off as he sank deeper into worry and contemplation.

xXx

Seeing the troubled look on Danny's face Dark sighed. He didn't understand the boy, for all they were practically the same person. Danny seemed to have a lot more insecurities, and not only because of what Dark had done to him.

It seemed like Danny was different than Dark had been even before his parents and friends had been killed in the explosion. He wondered what had happened in the time between when everyone was supposed to die and when Dark showed back up.

What a way he decided to show up in too. Dark wasn't sure what he thought about that now, looking back. It seemed like a good idea when he had first done it. After thinking about it it seemed like Clockwork had been the one to set everything up in the first place so apparently it was supposed to happen, but...

Yes, he was evil. He reveled in that fact. He loved slaughtering innocents, creating chaos, terrorizing the masses. He had thought he had it almost perfect in his reality. Dark had chosen exactly what he wanted to do and exactly when he wanted to do it. Danny hadn't had that choice.

Looking down at the younger boy Dark felt a pang of something, regret? remorse?, course through him and he scowled. He wasn't supposed to feel anything like that. He supposed that spending every day together with someone you might come to feel something about them but he hadn't counted on this happening.

For a moment Dark wondered what it would be like for him to have a normal teenage life. Well, relatively normal, even if he still had ghost powers. What might have happened if Danny had been able to go through school as normal, college, girlfriends, dating. Maybe getting married and having children. Would any children he had have powers too?

Maybe in another reality those questions might be answered. This one though, it was already set. Dark was sure even if he disappeared now that nothing would ever be normal or all right again for Danny.

For the first time since he had absorbed Vlads ghost half Dark felt some regret for his actions.

"I'm sorry Danny."

xXx

"I'm sorry Danny."

Danny flinched in shock, accidentally falling off the couch and onto the cold floor. He must be hearing things, there was no way Dark could have just apologized. How could he apologize for _anything_ after all this.

Still trying to convince himself he was having auditory hallucinations Danny didn't notice the older man come down off the couch and sit next to him. He was laying on his back looking up at the dull gray ceiling when suddenly Dark invaded his vision, leaning down for a kiss. It only lasted a few seconds and when Dark sat back up Danny blurted out the first thing that came to his mind.

"So you're not bored of me?"

He quickly covered his mouth and wished he could melt into the floor. He told himself didn't care. He _didn't_ want to know, that was just what had been on his mind. He _did_ want away from Dark. He did.

"Bored? Whatever gave you that idea?" Dark chuckled and Danny sat up so they were sitting across from each other between the couch and television.

Danny closed his eyes and took a deep breath, slowly letting it out as he tried to figure out what to say. Maybe this was what he had been sensing when he got up. The change that was taking place, something shifting in the air.

"You weren't there. In the morning." Danny finally said. "When I came out here you just wanted to sit. I..." he trailed off biting his lip.

When they had first came here Dark had made a point of doing sexual things to Danny every day. Sometimes less, usually more until it seemed Danny had gotten addicted to the feeling. He had slowly started doing it less often, but still often enough that to not be touched was unusual. It made Danny uncomfortable to think that the reason he was so anxious was that Dark had made no move to do anything to him.

xXx

_Dark would touch me every day. He would make sure he touched me in one way or another. In the early days it would always be for sex, or some derivative thereof. He would find a way to work me up, make me want it so bad that he seemed to be doing me a favor relieving the pressure._

_As time went on those touches became less frequent and then he would only touch me in passing. A touch to the shoulder, a pat on the head, a stroke on the arm. First it only made me nervous, wondering what he was waiting for, wondering if, when, he would do something more._

_Slowly my wondering just became frustration. Instead of 'When will you touch me' it became 'Please touch me'.  
I found out what he was waiting for one day when it just became too much. I was so frustrated, so out of my mind with the need he had implanted in me that I did it._

_I touched myself. Masturbated. Wanked. However many terms there are for it. And it felt good._ Really _good, and I was doing it to_ him.

_He walked in on me of course, all flushed and needing. I realized it then, with that smile, that way he sort of swaggered over to where I was that this was what he had been trying to do. I realized at that moment he had complete control over me, what my body did, what pattern my thoughts took._

_I realized I was his._

xXx

Dark sighed and brushed a hand through his hair. Bored of Danny? How could that happen? Danny obviously thought it was possible though, with the way he had reacted to the kiss and his question and half-answer afterword.

Sure he intentionally ignored him sometimes, after all the boy did deserve a break after all he did. Then the other half of what Danny said registered. Had he changed Dannys consciousness to think that if he wasn't doing anything sexual to him that he was unwanted, unneeded?

Shaking his head Dark pushed away those thoughts. He should not be worrying about this kind of thing. He shouldn't be worrying about _any_ type of thing, he had gotten rid of his emotions years ago and he did not appreciate them trying to make another appearance.

Still, though, he felt like he needed to reassure the boy. He liked him with a bit of spice, and the way he was moping around right now was not doing anything for either of them. The only way he could think of doing it though, was to give him the sexual attention he had apparently been withholding.

He honestly wasn't opposed to it, in fact he liked it quite a bit. The only problem he had with it right now was what it was doing to Danny's mentality.

As they sat there on the floor staring at each other Dark made his decision. He would give Danny what he needed. He had a feeling that something else might happen too, and he decided that whatever it was he wouldn't do anything about it.

xXx

Danny wasn't all that surprised when Dark stood up and put a hand out to help Danny up as well. He also expected, _anticipated_ , going down the hallway to their room.

Their room where so much had happened. A place to start everything, and a place to finish everything as well. Danny wasn't sure what had brought these thoughts on and it was making him more nervous than he had been in a long time.

Maybe this was what Clockwork had been waiting for. Maybe he would appear any minute to give them instructions on what their role was in the timeline.

Danny mentally shook his head, trying to clear his thoughts as Dark pushed him gently down on the bed, crawling on top of him. The younger boy wasn't used to that type of precious, soft attention and it almost embarrassed him.

Things were usually fast, rough, hard, no time to really think about what was going on, just to feel. Slowing it down made things different though. It gave him time to think about what was going on and how things had changed from the time before they had come here.

Dark slid his hands up Danny's shirt to remove it, exposing his torso. He leaned down and nipped at his collarbone making Danny whimper slightly, in pleasure, Dark knew, before licking up his throat and kissing him deeply.

Danny felt himself becoming turned on as Darks tongue entered his mouth, moving around and encouraging Danny's to move as well. Danny moaned and wiggled his hips, still trying to keep movement at a minimum since he was confused. Dark hadn't acted like this before, and the closest it had been was the first time they'd had sex when they were trapped here.

Dark took a moment to break the kiss and take off his t-shirt, tossing it carelessly to the side. Danny's hand automatically moved up to rest against the older mans toned chest, just taking a minute to feel the abnormal cold that radiated off of him. Danny sighed softly when Dark moved again, his thigh between Danny's legs so that the next time Danny wiggled he would be moving against him.

One of Darks hands was stroking Danny's torso, every once and awhile pinching a sensitive spot to make Danny gasp or twitch and Dark could tell that Danny desperately wanted him to do something else, something _more_. Dark kissed him again and to his slight surprise Danny kissed him back, raising his head for more.

With an inward smile Dark moved back a bit and slid his hand lower down Danny's chest to the line of his boxers, and lower.

"You want me." he said, pushing down Dannys boxers just enough to grab his member and start stroking it slowly.

Danny nodded silently, biting his lip, knowing Dark was going to say something else as well.

"Does it still seem like I'm bored of you, Danny?" Dark said with soft intensity lowering his head so his face was inches away, "I could never be bored of you, not even if I wanted to."

Danny could feel his face heating up at those words. In one way it almost sounded as if Dark felt something for him, but in another it was just like they were stuck together no matter what.

Swallowing Danny replied, "N-no. I'm, um," he licked his lips nervously, trying to think of a way to say what he was thinking that didn't sound awkward, "Thank you."

Dark smiled, a gesture so rare, not at all like his smirk, that it shocked Danny into an even deeper silence which didn't matter because Dark was kissing him again. 

Some abstract part of Dannys brain registered that something significant had just happened but it was pushed away with another part saying that he just lost his boxers.

Pulling back again Danny felt a slight trail of saliva coming out of the corner of his mouth. He was sure his face was flushed and he could tell he was panting though it seemed as if he was watching what was going on instead of it happening to him. Everything seemed sort of surreal, even when Dark kissed him softly on his jawline and pressed a finger into him.

Danny found it odd that he still couldn't use his ghost powers, and it seemed that Dark could only use two. The one that allowed him to change his form, and the one that allowed him to create ectoplasmic lube. The latter was more disturbing, and sometimes distressing, than the former, but at times like this not necessarily unwelcome. He had learned the hard way that being taken dry was quite a bit more painful than when Dark used his makeshift lube.

Like everything about the ghost it was cold, making him flinch in shock of that as well as the intrusion. He had gotten more used to it, but this time still seemed odd. When Dark added another finger he gasped and bit his lip again.

Dark removed his fingers and slicked himself up, spreading Dannys legs even more and getting into position. Danny made another sound low in his throat when he felt Dark against him, not entering him yet.

He knew he had never wanted this. Danny knew he would have never wanted this. Dark had changed him to want this, but still. He wanted it. He wanted it _now_ , and if that meant exerting a little force in whatever they had, he would do it. Even if it meant something was happening between them, he had to.

In a movement that somehow managed to surprise himself, who was doing it, as well as Dark he wrapped his legs around Dark and pulled him forward and into him. Though he had been expecting it the sudden stretching and feeling caused Danny to throw his head back, his mouth opening to release a cry of mostly ecstasy.

He heard Dark bite back a gasp as well as they both lay there panting. Dark closed his eyes and let out a low moan of pleasure. He would always love this, the tightness, the warmth of someone so _alive_.

After a moment he moved and grinned at the small 'Ah!' Danny let out beneath him.

Pulling almost all the way out he slammed back in for another quite vocal exclamation from the boy under him. He did this a few more times, finding the spot he was looking for which made Danny scream, before settling in on a medium set pace. Danny started pushing back against him with more than just the instinctual movements. Dark could tell it was completely intentional and it was just one more odd thing that had happened this time.

Dark could count on his hands the number of times Danny had consensually participated in their activities, at least without other prompting.

Slipping a hand between their bodies Dark grabbed Danny's member again and stroked it slowly making the boy arch against him even more. Leaning down to kiss him Danny responded enthusiastically. Their tongues slid together sensuously mimicking the movements of their bodies.

A few minutes later Dark had Danny on sensory overload, so when he bit his neck, and squeezed his cock, and hit that spot all at the same time it was all Danny could take and he came, arching up with a choked cry. Dark came a few moments later with a low moan and Danny shivered as he felt him release inside of him.

They lay there panting for a minute, thinking about what had happened. What had lead up to that happening. The things that seemed to change between them, making everything so much more confusing. They should talk, but neither were sure what to say.

Dark pulled out, but didn't really move, just staring down at Danny.

"I realize now that I was wrong about a few things I had previously assumed." Dark said suddenly.

Danny started, he wasn't expecting Dark to say something and the only thing he could say was "What?"

xXx

_Time to decide._

xXx

A greenish gray glow spread through the room, freezing everything. The apparition glided into the room, examining their contents. The 'contents' however were a pair of males, the smaller with a look of slight apprehension and curiosity and the other had a look of contemplation, quite the unusual expression for that one.

Clockwork decided it was a good thing he had lost all sense of awkwardness or modesty centuries ago or else the position the two were in would be very uncomfortable.

Gliding over to the pair Clockwork dropped a Time Pendent over Danny's head, the boy coming out of the time freeze with a start. He looked around confused for a second before his eyes settled on Clockwork.

"W-w...Clockwork?" He finally stuttered out, his eyes widening as he realized exactly what position he was in, and that Clockwork was there as well. He had only seen Clockwork a few times since they had come here, and when he had appeared he hadn't bothered to stop time.

Suddenly Danny got a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. What was going on?

"It's time, Danny." the ghost said and reached out a hand. Danny swallowed when he saw there was a small gun sitting on his palm.

"N-now? I mean...why? If this is why we..." he trailed off, unable to speak, looking between the gun and the ghost on top of him.

Time. It was time. He was going to kill him, or at least try to. Why did it feel so horrible though? He swallowed again against the lump forming in his throat.

"Danny," Clockwork said, getting the boys attention before he panicked. "It's time. You can do it, don't worry. You want this."

Slowly Danny reached his hand out for the gun. Somehow he knew as soon as he grabbed it he would have to act. No time to think. No time to decide. No time to regret.

xXx

_No time._

xXx

Dark opened his mouth to reply when Danny flickered. It confused him for a second, but then his eyes widened as he saw Danny now held a gun. He didn't make a move to do anything, remembering what he had promised himself earlier.

'Clockwork.'

They stared at each other for a moment, both still frozen in shock when suddenly Danny whipped the gun forward so it was pointed at Darks chest, where his heart should be.

"I realized," Dark said at the same time, "That you do still have a spine."

xXx

_As I lay there under Darks dead body, blood oozing out of the chest wound I created I realized something as well._

_I had just killed somebody. He may have been evil, he may have been doing things to me against my will. He may have destroyed the world, murdered countless people, but still._

_I_ killed _him._

 _My shock was as brilliant as the redgreen of his blood mixed with ectoplasm splashed across my upper body. I told myself as I sat there shaking I had_ wanted _this. I_ wanted _to be rid of him, rid of his influence, rid of his actions._

_Free._

_I freed myself from my physical prison and secured the bolts on my mental one. Somehow, ever since I killed him, no, ever since I saw the gun in Clockworks hand I knew what would happen. Everything is inevitable._

xXx

A little girl with dark brown hair and brilliant violet eyes played with a ball in the front yard of her house. Getting distracted for a moment she accidentally let the ball roll down to the road. She chased after it, making sure to check both ways before going into the road to get it.

As she glanced left, right, and left again she noticed something odd, and a little scary. There was a boy coming down the street. He didn't look very good, kind of sick and he looked like she felt when she had a fever.

She watched him with wide eyes as he came closer and as he got to her driveway he stopped and looked at her. The little girl took a step back, afraid, before the boy suddenly collapsed.

She suppressed the urge to scream and ran inside calling for her mom.

xXx

When Sam heard her daughter calling for her she knew it wasn't just a normal summons. There was something, an edge to her voice that made Sam hurry even more than normal. When she caught her and she was kneeling with her daughter grabbing her around the shoulders babbling about a boy who had fallen down outside Sams eyebrows snapped together.

Gently prying off her small child she told her to wait in her room and she would go see what was happening. Sam grabbed a baseball bat and looked through her curtains first before going outside.

Her heart leapt for a second when she first saw the small black haired boy but she forced herself to calm down. That was impossible, Danny had been taken thirteen years ago, there was no way that could be him.

Swallowing thickly she opened the door and crept outside, glad that her neighbors were all either asleep or at work already. The closer she got to the boy the more convinced she got that it was Danny though. When she got right next to him she knelt down and tapped on his shoulder and by the reaction she got if the boy had been healthy he would have bolted, instead he just let out a small sound of shock and rolled over, his eyes wide.

Her eyes widened as well, as did his if that was possible, as they recognized each other.

"Danny?"

"Sam?"

xXx

Sam was in shock. She couldn't believe that Danny had reappeared after all this time, not looking a day older than when he had been taken away. A million questions were running through her head, how did you escape? what happened to you? are you ok? She knew that the last question was probably stupid to ask, but she wanted to anyway.

Currently Danny was resting in the guest bedroom in clothes she had borrowed from her husband. The ones he had been wearing had been dirty. It was odd though, from the way it clung to him it seemed as if there had been something on his skin and it had soaked through his shirt other than just getting on him.

She was sure Danny had questions too, after all it was obvious that it had been awhile. Getting a cup of coffee Sam went back to the room to find Danny sitting up, his arms around his knees staring down at the bed.

Sam was struck by how young and vulnerable he looked, and it made her her want to reach out and touch him. Pat his arm or stroke his hair like a child to make him feel better. She remembered the phobia he had developed about being touched before, though, so she restrained herself.

Danny took the coffee from her with a small grin of thanks and sipped it, smiling more when he realized she had used Tuckers special blend. Tucker. He wondered where he was now, and Val and Jazz and his parents too. Especially his parents, they had had no clue about what had been happening and arrived just in time to see him be taken away.

His curiosity got the better of him even though he wasn't sure he wanted to know but he asked anyway, "What happened to everyone? Like my parents and Jazz and Tucker?"

Sam took out the chair of the desk in the room and sat on it and Danny thought about how different she looked, but it was so similar at the same time. She had her hair a little longer than shoulder length but didn't put it up. It seemed like she didn't work today, if she worked at all but Danny couldn't imagine her not having a job, and her casual house clothes were a little more modest, or longer, version of what she wore in school.

Sam took a breath and said, "Well, Tucker and Val ended up getting married, which nobody really saw coming. Jazz moved to Las Vegas and started her own detective/psychiatric consulting agency."

"Vegas?" Danny asked and raised an eyebrow. He wasn't too surprised about her occupation, especially with everything that had been going on before he was taken away, but he couldn't imagine her living in a place like that.

Then again it could be a completely different place for all he knew. As he thought about that he realized he didn't want to know how long he had been gone. It wasn't like it mattered anyway.

"Yeah, we were kind of surprised as well," Sam said sending a timid smile at him that he returned, but it faded after a moment.

"What about my parents?"

Sam resisted the urge to chew nervously on her bottom lip. Finally she said, "They...were really confused. They didn't know what was happening. The only thing they knew was that there was a ghost, Vlad had just been killed, and you were gone. Jazz tried to explain a little to them, but it didn't really seem to do anything." she paused, "They stayed in Amity Park until Jazz graduated but then they moved. I don't know where they went, but Jazz might."

Danny took this news in silence, but it was more of the reminder of Vlad dieing than his parents doing anything that upset him. Though Dark was the first person he had really killed first hand, Vlads death had still been entirely his fault. If only he hadn't acted so suspicious, kissed him, told him everything.

Blinking away the sudden burning sensation in his eyes, why should he cry, he hadn't in years, he lapsed into silence again.

Sam couldn't contain her curiosity any more, she had to know. "Danny, um, how...how did you escape?"

She saw him suddenly stiffen and his head turned violently to the side so she couldn't see his face. This made her feel a little bad but she really did want to know.

Danny mumbled something she couldn't hear so she got up and knelt next to the bed and prompted, "What?"

The mumbling stopped for a second and Danny slowly turned to face her. His lips moved for a second without any sound and finally he said, "I killed him."

xXx

_Admitting something out loud is a normal occurrence. Our language is spoken and we say so many things all the time that even our darkest secrets will come out eventually. There are things so hard to say that when we do say them we go into shock although we've already admitted it mentally._

_I was raped by Dark Phantom at age fifteen. I had admitted that in my head, but when I had to say it out loud it seemed so much worse._

_I killed Dark Phantom at age fifteen after being trapped in a timeless place for years. I admitted this to myself a few seconds after I had managed to roll his corpse off of me where it had fallen._

_Saying 'I killed him' was the hardest, most shocking thing I ever did to myself._

_It brought emotions and thoughts to the surface, things that normally would have stayed buried._

_I killed him, and in more than one sense of the word I killed myself._

xXx

Sam said she was going to go make some calls and she would be back. Danny didn't notice, he had started silently crying.

It was too much. Everything had happened at once, and there were no answers for any of it. Why had Clockwork kept them for that long? What would have Dark said if they had talked? What else could they have done in the tower to make things happen differently? What if he had stopped protesting for the sake of protesting and started telling Dark he really didn't mind?

He let out a choked sob. Danny wasn't sure what to think anymore, he would be glad if he just didn't have to think any more. He wanted to talk to Dark, see what he had to say about everything.

That was impossible though. He was dead, just like Vlad.

Dannys emotions were in turmoil and he didn't notice at first when the little girl from earlier crept into the room holding a box of tissues. He did notice her when she set them on the bed and started to creep away again.

He let out a little chuckle under his breath, only kids, and gave her a watery smile that she hesitantly returned.

"Thank you," he said.

Now that the boy had said something he didn't seem so scary any more. "I'm Dante." she said boldly.

"Thank you, Dante." Danny replied accordingly and the girl puffed up in pride at his voice. She liked that and as she walked out of the room she decided she wanted to do something to make everybody proud, but for now she had to go to school.

Looking down at the kleenex box, all bright colored with Winnie the Pooh and Eeyore he thought about how that's how life should be. Smiles and cheerfulness. Sometimes a little gloomy, but there would always be friends to cheer you up and show you the brighter side. He didn't have any of those any more.

Technically he still had Tucker and Sam, but they had grown up without him. He didn't know anything about their lives now, as they didn't know anything about him. Could they still be friends with such a vast difference between them? Danny didn't think so, at least not like before. The only thing that could happen would be like having a mentor to look up to, or for them a nervous child to reassure.

He didn't want that. Now that he could have a life again he realized he didn't want one. In his opinion there was no point. What could he do? Go back to school? 

Not likely.

He was still too 'young' to get a job, so that was pointless.

Glancing around the room he noticed the desk. Getting up he shuffled over to it and went through it taking out some paper and a pen. With another quick glance at the clock Danny started writing. When he was done he folded it, but then after a second thought uncreased it and set it on the desk.

Danny felt he owed them a little bit in the way of explanation after all, seeing as how Sam was probably currently in the process of calling people to tell them he was back.

Sitting back down on the bed he was unsurprised when a gun, the gun appeared. Just like before he knew as soon as he grabbed it time would be up. No time for regrets. No time for thoughts.

"I'm sorry, I love you."

No time for sadness.

xXx

_The future is secured. The past was inevitable. The present is as it should be._

xXx

Sam jumped when she heard a sharp, yet oddly muffled sound coming from somewhere in the house. Immediately she thought of Danny. Telling Tucker, whom she was on the phone with, that she would call him back she set the phone in the receiver and started quickly but cautiously towards where she left Danny.

The door was slightly ajar and she had a feeling that Dante had gone to see him before she left for school. She seemed a little different, more confident and it made Sam happy though she was a bit confused as to how it had come about.

Opening the door her eyes widened in shock and she let out a whispered "No."

Rushing into the room to the bed where Dannys corpse lay she couldn't speak. What had happened? Why had this happened? He was supposed to be back, everything was supposed to be good again!

How had it happened? Sam couldn't see the gun, for obviously it was a gun of some sort that had left that unmistakable hole in Danny's chest. Something was strange about it though, almost as if it was one of the guns Danny's parents used to own to use against ghosts.

Looking around the room, still in shock, Sam noticed a desk drawer was open and a sheet of paper was sitting there. Swallowing, wondering what was going to happen now, she went over and picked it up.

Glancing through the letters a hand came up to rest against her mouth as horror filled her. Her eyes misted up as she glanced from the letter to Danny and back again. Loss, sadness, anguish, anger, all rushed through her. This shouldn't have happened.

Nothing should have ever happened, everyone was supposed to have their happily ever after.

All of her emotions were released in one scream before she broke down on the floor the already slightly crumpled paper being crushed in one hand.

" _Danny!_ "

xXx

_There are a few things nobody can escape. Society, obligations, and other things like that people can pretend to escape, but still they're always still there._

_Death is always there._

_Darkness is always there._

_Nobody can get away from either. You can hide from Darkness, surround yourself with lights. Live in a city where there is never true darkness, sleep with a light of some sort._

_You can think you know true darkness, closing your eyes or covering them with hands or a pillow._

_Those can't even compare to true darkness. Being hundreds of feet under the surface of the earth in a cave with a flashlight off. Impenetrable inky blackness that as soon as it appears you feel instinctual fear. What's out there? Will I really see when the light comes back on?_ Will _the light come back on?_

_My light didn't come back on._

_My fear was there, but it was subdued by other emotions._

_Dark was my light, as ironic as that seems. He implanted himself in my thoughts so my fear of losing him was so strong I didn't know it was there until he was gone._

_When you take away everything there's only dark._

_When I take away everything there's only Dark._

_I'm sorry, I tried. I lived, I was trapped in a circle of emptiness, I escaped to become trapped within myself._

_When it comes down to it there's only one thing I can't escape from. Only one thing I need. Only one thing I can't live without._

Dark.

xXx

End Paranoia

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [As the Clock Tolls Death](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3801679) by [MyShadesAndMyRedConverse](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MyShadesAndMyRedConverse/pseuds/MyShadesAndMyRedConverse)




End file.
